| Document | Document Title |
|---|---|
| US09521333B2 |
Imaging apparatus and control method of imaging apparatus
An imaging apparatus including an imaging unit that obtains a plurality of photographed images of different photographing conditions includes a setting unit that sets photographing conditions of the imaging unit, an instruction unit that instructs photographing by the imaging unit, and a notification unit that notifies photographing conditions set by the setting unit before the instruction unit instructs the photographing, wherein the notification unit notifies, before the instruction unit instructs the photographing, only a photographing condition of a longest exposure time from among a plurality of photographing conditions for obtaining the plurality of photographed images or a sum of exposure times for obtaining the plurality of photographed images. |
| US09521330B2 |
Endoscopic image processing device, information storage device and image processing method
The endoscopic image processing device includes an image acquisition section that acquires a normal observation image and a zoom observation image, the normal observation image being an image that includes an image of an object, and the zoom observation image being an image that magnifies the image of the object within an observation area that is part of the normal observation image, an attention area determination section that specifies an attention area on the zoom observation image, and a boundary setting section that detects a position of a boundary on the normal observation image that corresponds to a boundary of the attention area specified on the zoom observation image based on pixel values of the zoom observation image, and sets a boundary image at the detected position of the boundary on the normal observation image. |
| US09521329B2 |
Display device, display method, and computer-readable recording medium
A display device includes an imaging unit configured to capture an image of an object and to generate image data of the object, a display unit configured to display the image corresponding to the image data generated by the imaging unit, and a display controller configured to cause the display unit to display a sample image in which at least a line of sight of the object has been changed when the imaging unit captures the image of the object. An imaging direction of the imaging unit and a display direction of the display unit are matched. The sample image is an object image in which the line of sight has changed from front to a direction other than the front. |
| US09521327B2 |
Image capturing apparatus, method for controlling image capturing apparatus, display control apparatus, and method for controlling display control apparatus
An image capturing apparatus includes an image capturing unit, a recording control unit configured to perform control to record an image captured by the image capturing unit on a recording medium, a display unit configured to display the image, a detection unit configured to detect information about ambient brightness of the image capturing apparatus, and a control unit configured to perform control to change brightness of the display unit based on a detection result by the detection unit, wherein the control unit performs control so as not to change the brightness of the display unit based on the detection result by the detection unit while the image is recorded on the recording medium. |
| US09521323B2 |
Power supply device having boosting circuit and boosting control applicable to electronic devices
A power supply device includes a first load circuit that operates by a first voltage; a second load circuit that operates by a second voltage higher than the first voltage; a boosting circuit that generates the first voltage if the power supply device is in a first driving mode, and generates the second voltage if the power supply device is in a second driving mode; a first feedback circuit that connects the first load circuit and the boosting circuit if the power supply device is in the first driving mode; and a second feedback circuit that connects the first load circuit and the boosting circuit if the power supply device is in the second driving mode. The first load circuit is operated in the first driving mode. The first load circuit and the second load circuit are operated in the second driving mode. |
| US09521321B1 |
Enabling manually triggered multiple field of view image capture within a surround image mode for multi-lens mobile devices
A user activation of an image capture function of a mobile device is received. The image capture function is for a surround image mode. Two or more camera lenses are approximately concurrently activated. A front-side image from a first camera lens and a rear-side image from a second camera lens can be optically captured. A second front-side image from the first camera lens and a second rear-side image from the second camera lens can be optically captured responsive to a manual pan/tilt/zoom operation of the front-side or rear-side lense. Content from the front-side images and content from the rear-side images are recorded in a non-transitory storage medium of the mobile device within a single file for a surround mode image. |
| US09521320B2 |
Image processing apparatus, image capturing apparatus, image processing method, and storage medium
Conventionally, on a subject in which range, refocus can be performed at the time of image capturing or at the time of editing an image is not specified clearly, and therefore, it is difficult for a user to capture an image or to edit an image in a manner the user intends. An image processing apparatus has an acquisition unit configured to acquire an image including a plurality of subject areas and distance information corresponding to the plurality of subject areas and a generation unit configured to generate a shifted image in which positions of the plurality of subject areas are shifted in the image based on the distance information. |
| US09521315B2 |
Apparatus and method for forming new images by determining stylistic settings of existing images
Apparatus and method are provided. The apparatus includes at least one processor and a memory. The solution includes determining settings of one or more images or video clips stored in the memory of the apparatus or retrieved from a network. The processor is configured to apply these determined settings when controlling the forming one or more new images. |
| US09521313B2 |
Image capturing control apparatus, image capturing control method, and computer program
An information processing system that detects that a first user input is received at a user interface corresponding to a display configured to display an image captured by an image capturing unit; determines a status of a timer corresponding to the user interface upon detecting the first user input; controls an image capture operation of the image capturing unit upon detecting the first input and determining that the status of the timer satisfies a first predetermined condition; and controls the display to display an image condition settings menu upon detecting the first input and determining that the status of the timer satisfies a second predetermined condition. |
| US09521312B2 |
Focus detection apparatus, control method for the same, and image capture apparatus
Signals of pixels are acquired from an image sensor in which a first pixel, a second pixel, and an imaging pixel are arranged, the first pixel receiving light flux that is restricted to light flux passing through a first portion of a pupil area of an imaging optical system, the second pixel receiving light flux that is restricted to light flux passing through a second portion that is different from the first portion of the pupil area, and the imaging pixel being different from the first and second pixels. Based on the acquired signals, estimated signals at a position at which the first and second pixel is not arranged are estimated. A defocus amount of the imaging optical system is calculated based on evaluation values obtained based on the estimated signals and the signals from the first and second pixels. |
| US09521309B2 |
Data management in a linear-array-based microscope slide scanner
Systems and methods for capturing image data using a line scan camera. In an embodiment, a line scan camera captures image data of a sample as a plurality of image stripes. A processor may coarsely align two or more of the plurality of image stripes according to a synchronization process while the line scan camera is capturing at least one of the plurality of image stripes. Subsequently, the processor may also finely align the two or more image stripes using pattern matching. |
| US09521307B2 |
Electronic device flash shutter
An electronic device may have a camera module for acquiring still and video digital images of a subject. A light source such as a light-emitting diode may serve as a flash for the camera module. A shutter may be mounted above the light-emitting diode. When the light-emitting diode is not being used to produce a flash of light for illuminating the subject, the shutter may be closed to block the light-emitting diode from view by a user. During image acquisition operations in which it is desired to illuminate the subject, the shutter may be opened to allow light from the light-emitting diode to exit the electronic device. The electronic device may have a touch screen display with an active region and an inactive region. The camera module and light source may be mounted under a portion of the inactive region of the display. The shutter may include a filter structure. |
| US09521305B2 |
Optical member conveying device
An optical member conveying device (90) of an embodiment of the present invention includes: a small LED illumination device (13) which (i) is included in a lens unit suction head (14) which adheres to a top surface of a lens section (50) and (ii) emits light from above the top surface of the lens section (50) toward an opening hole (3a) from which light enters, the opening hole (3a) being provided on the top surface of the lens section (50); and a control section which controls the lens unit suction head (14) to carry out an alignment of the lens section (50) in accordance with a projection image obtained by projecting, by use of light emitted from the small LED illumination device (13), the opening hole (3a) on a side of a back surface of the lens section (50). |
| US09521304B2 |
Multiple photosites pixel architecture
An image sensor pixel may include an array of four photosites, a transverse isolator wall separating the array in two rows of two photosites, and a longitudinal isolator wall separating the array in two columns of two photosites. Both ends of the longitudinal wall may be set back relative to the edges of the array. First and second conversion nodes may be arranged in the spaces between the longitudinal wall and the edges of the matrix. Each conversion node may be common to two adjacent photosites, and an independent transfer gate may be between each photosite and the corresponding conversion node. |
| US09521301B2 |
Fixed view magnetic camera
At least one aspect of present disclosure is directed towards a camera that includes a magnetic base and a removable main camera unit. The removable main camera unit may include an outer casing, a processor, a lens housing, a wireless communications interface, and an inner casing. The inner casing may reside within the outer casing and includes at least a metallic portion and a non-metallic portion. The non-metallic portion may form a non-metallic region that may extend from at least a first boundary of the metallic portion to a second boundary of the metallic portion through a central axis of the inner casing. The removable main camera unit may be configured to be removably coupled to the magnetic base based on a magnetic force between the magnetic base and the metallic portion of the inner casing. |
| US09521300B2 |
Camera for mounting
A camera includes a housing, a digital video recorder, a camera lens, buttons, at least one port, a battery compartment, a holder for a removable storage device, a microphone connected, and a mounting rail. |
| US09521298B2 |
Color management system
Management of color of image files in digital devices is described. A color management system can extract metadata from an image file based on a type of the image file. The color management system then creates a color profile based on the metadata extracted. The color management system further creates a virtual device, and assigns the color profile created to the virtual device. As such, multiple color profiles can be associated with a single physical device using the concept of virtual devices. Furthermore, the extraction of metadata and generation of color profiles can also be centralized in the color management system, which may be integrated into an operating system executable on a computing device. |
| US09521289B2 |
Line based image processing and flexible memory system
Techniques are provided to implement line based processing of thermal images and a flexible memory system. In one example, individual lines of a thermal image frame may be provided to an image processing pipeline. Image processing operations may be performed on the individual lines in stages of the image processing pipeline. A memory system may be used to buffer the individual lines in the pipeline stages. In another example, a memory system may be used to send and receive data between various components without relying on a single shared bus. Data transfers may be performed between different components and different memories of the memory system using a switch fabric to route data over different buses. In another example, a memory system may support data transfers using different clocks of various components, without requiring the components and the memory system to all be synchronized to the same clock source. |
| US09521282B2 |
Image forming apparatus
An image forming apparatus including: a sheet feeding portion configured to feed a sheet to a sheet conveying path; an image forming portion configured to form an image on the sheet; a sheet discharging portion configured to discharge the sheet; a sheet re-conveying path configured to guide the sheet on which the image has been formed to the sheet conveying path again; an original feeding portion configured to feed an original; an original feeding path configured to guide the original to the sheet re-conveying path; an image reading portion configured to read an image of the original; an original discharging path configured to guide the original guided along the sheet re-conveying path to an original discharging portion; and an original conveying portion configured to convey the original which has been guided along the original feeding path toward the original discharging path. |
| US09521280B2 |
Systems and methods for display of regulatory information related to labeling
Provided are embodiments of systems and methods related to labeling, and more particular to labeling that may be guided by regulatory requirements. A system comprises an electronic device having a user interface capable of displaying a WYSIWYG image of a label and providing access to regulatory information related to the displayed label. The system may further determine compliance with regulatory guidelines by a user-edited label. The electronic device may be, or be in communication with, a label printer to initiate printing of a displayed label. A method includes the steps of accessing a WYSIWYG image of a label and accessing regulatory information related to such label using a handheld electronic device. The method may further include the steps of verifying compliance of a label with regulatory guidelines or requirements and initiating printing of such label, which may be adhesive. |
| US09521279B2 |
Image reproducing method and digital processing machine using such method
An image reproducing method for a digital processing machine is provided. The image reproducing method includes the following steps: scanning an original to generate image data; analyzing the image data to generate an analysis result; designating M proper user setting items among N user setting items according to the analysis result, wherein N and M are positive integers, and M is less than N; providing only the M proper user setting items on a human-machine interface; and outputting a copy of the original according to a user input received through the human-machine interface. In addition, a digital processing machine providing an intelligent human-machine interface is also provided. |
| US09521273B2 |
Information processing device and recording medium that ensures reduced count of times of band processing
An information processing device includes a communication circuit, a storage circuit, a communications control circuit, a spool circuit, a RIP processing circuit, a matching circuit, and a grouping circuit. The RIP processing circuit rasterizes the stored one or more pieces of document data to generate one or more pieces of rasterized data. The matching circuit performs matching processing of the generated one or more pieces of rasterized data. The grouping circuit groups pieces of rasterized data with an identical content one another among the one or more pieces of rasterized data based on the result of the matching processing. The communications control circuit transmits the grouped one or more pieces of rasterized data to an image forming apparatus by each of the groups via the communication circuit. |
| US09521270B1 |
Changing in real-time the perspective of objects captured in images
Capturing an image of an object from a captured perspective and creating a plurality of candidate object areas. Each candidate object area potentially enclosing the object captured in the image. From the plurality of candidate object areas, a candidate object area is selected as enclosing the object. A corrected image of the object is generated based on the selected candidate object area. The corrected image shows the object transformed to a corrected perspective. The corrected image is displayed. |
| US09521268B2 |
Application layer integration into a multi-rat access and handover environment
A wireless communication device communicating with a serving base station in a wireless communication environment may have one or more applications running. When seeking to handover from the serving base station to a target base station, the wireless communication device adjusts the configurations of the applications based on the new communication link properties. Likewise, when an application is loaded that prefers communication link properties that exceeds a current communication link's capabilities, the wireless communication device may seek out and hand over to other communication links. By cooperatively coordinating the functionality of installed applications with communication link properties, the wireless communication device can maintain high levels of device and application functionality. |
| US09521266B2 |
Charging method, authentication method, charging device, and authentication device
A charging method, an authentication method, a charging device, and an authentication device. The charging method includes receiving a service unit request sent by an access device, calculating a granted service unit according to a current tariff, determining a reporting time point according to a tariff switch point and returning a service unit answer to the access device; and receiving a used service unit reported by the access device at the reporting time point, calculating a remaining service unit based on the granted service unit and the used service unit instructing the access device to perform a forcible offline operation. The technical solutions provided by the embodiments of the present disclosure may effectively reduce an occurrence probability of a user account overdraft, thereby reducing a loss caused by the user account overdraft to an operator. |
| US09521260B1 |
Automated response system providing customized prompts based on user situation
One embodiment provides a device comprising at least one processor, and a storage device storing instructions that when executed by the at least one processor causes the at least one processor to perform operations. The operations include receiving one or more user preferences for a first user, and, in response to the first user of the device initiating a communication, determining a current context of the first user. The current context identifies at least one of the following: a current location of the first user, whether the first user is stationary or driving, and a type of communication channel utilized for the communication. The operations further include selecting a communication format to facilitate the communication based on the current context, a recipient of the communication, and the one or more user preferences for the first user. |
| US09521258B2 |
Real-time call center call monitoring and analysis
Systems and methods are provided for analyzing conversations between customers and call center agents in real-time. An agent may be located at an agent station having a display screen. A continuous audio feed of the conversation between a customer and an agent may be received. For every second that the customer is speaking, a customer emotion score may be calculated in real-time. A frequency at which calculated customer emotion scores equal or exceed an emotion score threshold during a specified time interval may be calculated in real-time during the conversation. The calculated frequency for the customer may be compared, in real-time, to a plurality of specified frequency thresholds. A visual representation corresponding to a highest of the plurality of specified frequency thresholds that is equaled or exceeded by the calculated frequency for the customer may be displayed in real-time on the display screen of the agent station. |
| US09521257B2 |
Dialing telephone numbers in a contact center based on a dial-type indicator
A contact center dialing a telephone number to a destination party, such as a debtor, may discover that the number is obsolete, e.g., the number has been reassigned to a new subscriber. A purportedly current number may be obtained for the debtor, which may be a wireless number. Until the new number has been confirmed as being associated with the debtor, an agent manually dials that number to minimize liability to the contact center. Once the agent has verbally confirmed the new number is associated with the debtor, a record for this number in a dialing list is updated allowing future dialing attempts to occur automatically, by using a predictive dialer. In one embodiment, a dialing list module processes the dialing list so as to reflect when a number is obsolete and update the corresponding record when the new number is confirmed. |
| US09521255B1 |
Systems and methods for visual presentation and selection of IVR menu
Embodiments of the invention provide a system for generating an Interactive Voice Response (IVR) database, the system comprising a processor and a memory coupled to the processor. The memory comprising a list of telephone numbers associated with one or more destinations implementing IVR menus, wherein the one or more destinations are grouped based on a plurality of categories of the IVR menus. Further the memory includes instructions executable by said processor for automatically communicating with the one of more destinations, and receiving at least one customization record from said at least one destination to store in the IVR database. |
| US09521253B2 |
Interjurisdictional recording mechanism
The present invention provides a system for recording an interaction including, a telephone call between a caller and a digital processing system placed over an interjurisdictional boundary, and may include a telephone call placed to at least one called recipient. For example, a caller may place a telephone call over an interjurisdictional boundary to a remote computer server. The server may use an interactive voice response (IVR) unit to obtain caller identification information, provide recording identification information to the caller, and receive authorization from the caller to record an interaction between the caller and a call recipient. The server can also obtain testamentary intent information. A telephone call may then be placed by the server to the recipient, and a two-party digital voice recording can be made on the remote server of a three-way telephone call, in which the server is one of the parties. |
| US09521250B2 |
Telecommunication call management and monitoring system with voiceprint verification
A secure telephone call management system is provided for authenticating users of a telephone system in an institutional facility. Authentication of the users of the telephone call management system is accomplished by using a personal identification number, biometric means, and/or radio frequency means. The secure telephone call management system includes accounting software capable of limiting access to the system based on funds in a user's account, and includes management software capable of implementing widespread or local changes to the system. The system monitors a conversation in the telephone call to detect a presence of a first characteristic in audio of the conversation, and terminates the telephone call if the first characteristic does not match a second characteristic of biometric information of a user or a called party. |
| US09521248B2 |
Portable terminal and lock state cancellation method
A mobile phone 10 comprises a display 14, a touch panel 16, etc., and can set a lock state restricting performance of predetermined processing based on a touch operation. If the display 14 is turned ON when the lock state is set, a lock screen comprising a lock object (RO), etc. is displayed. If the lock screen is displayed when there is a new arrival mail, a mail object (Oa) is further displayed in the lock screen. At this time, if the lock object is dragged and dropped onto the mail object, a mail function is performed while the lock state is canceled. At this time, the new arrival mail is displayed on the display 14. |
| US09521247B2 |
Above-lock camera access
Apparatus and methods are disclosed for allowing smart phone users to “capture the moment” by allowing easy access to a camera application when a mobile device is in an above-lock (or locked) mode, while also preventing unauthorized access to other smart phone functionality. According to one embodiment of the disclosed technology, a method of operating a mobile device having an above-lock state and a below-lock state comprises receiving input data requesting invocation of an camera application when the mobile device is in the above-lock state and invoking the requested camera application on the device, where one or more functions of the requested application are unavailable as a result of the mobile device being in the above-lock state. |
| US09521239B2 |
Apparatus and method for automatic discovery and suggesting personalized gesture control based on user's habit and context
An apparatus and method for automatic discovery and suggesting personalized gestures from mobile terminal to control a plurality of devices in smart home system, based on user's habit and context. The method includes recording, via a mobile terminal, a context of the mobile terminal, recoding, via home system, actions taken by the plurality of devices in the home system, recognizing as a gesture command from a correlation of at least a portion of the recorded context of the user's mobile terminal with the recorded actions taken by the plurality of devices in the home system, and controlling at least one of the plurality of devices based a repetition of the gesture command, the controlling repeating the actions taken by the at least one of the plurality of devices in the home system. |
| US09521238B1 |
Establishing multiple short range wireless links between a vehicle and a mobile device
A mobile communication system and a method of establishing a wireless connection between a vehicle and at least one mobile device. The method includes: establishing a first short range wireless communication (SRWC) link between the vehicle and the mobile device; and using the first SRWC link to establish a second SRWC link between the vehicle and the mobile device, wherein the first and second SRWC links use different SRWC protocols. |
| US09521237B2 |
Cellular communication device with wireless pointing device function
A method and apparatus receive first input through a touch screen and communicate over a first wireless network responsive to the first input. The method and apparatus receive second input through the touch screen and use the second input to control a second device through a second wireless network. |
| US09521229B2 |
Mobile terminal device, non-transitory computer readable storage medium, and control method for mobile terminal device
A mobile terminal and methods are disclosed. A storage module stores at least first contact information including a first phone number and second contact information including a second phone number. A control module causes the display module to display a first image associated with the first phone number and a second image not associated with the phone number stored in the storage module, makes a call at the first phone number, if a first operation for selecting the first image is accepted, causes the display module to display at least the second contact information, if a second operation for selecting the second image is accepted, and causes the display module to display a third image associated with the second phone number instead of the second image, if a third operation for selecting the second contact information is accepted. |
| US09521225B2 |
Frame and app for smartphone for audio reading coded text
A small fold-down optical frame holds a smart phone that is provided with reading software that enables those with vision impairment to be able to hear the written word as audible speech. The frame has a tray and a base and legs connecting them. The tray holds the smart phone and positions it so that its camera is placed directly over a coded symbol containing the content of the printed page. One corner of the base is shaped such that a vision-impaired person can place the frame, by feel or touch, at the proper location for the smart phone to pick up the coded symbol. |
| US09521219B2 |
Systems, methods, and apparatuses using common addressing
Described herein are systems, methods, and apparatuses for device communication over IP. In some embodiments, IPv6 addresses are compressed into ISO/IEC 14908-1 addresses, and use leading zero suppression to compress the headers. In some embodiments, IPv4 the least significant two bytes of the IPv4 address are used as an ISO/IEC 14908-1 subnet and node number. |
| US09521210B2 |
Methods and apparatus to install voice over internet protocol (VoIP) devices
Methods and apparatus to install voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) devices are disclosed. An example method comprises receiving a device identifier and an authentication credential from a voice over Internet protocol (VoIP) device, and provisioning the device identifier to a subscriber account based on the authentication credential. |
| US09521209B2 |
Code generation
The present invention provides a method of generating computer executable code using components, each of which corresponds to a respective data manipulation service, typically implemented by a respective entity. The method includes defining a combination of components corresponding to a sequence of data manipulations. The data manipulations are then performed, which can be achieved by requesting the provision of each service from the respective entities in accordance with the defined component combination, thereby causing computer executable code to be generated. |
| US09521207B2 |
Unified integration management—contact center portal
A system and method is disclosed for providing web and portal enablement of a CTI-based call center, via markup languages and middleware technologies such as XML, J2EE, Web Services, and Message Oriented Middleware (JMS/MOM) technologies. The invention encompasses a system for translating data (including voice and telephony data) and events using a metadata translation layer, which transforms and encapsulates telephony data and events into well-formed markup language syntax. The translated data is then be passed through one or more industry standard interfaces (such as a native interface, XML interface, or web service) to corresponding clients (thin client, native client, e-business application client, wireless clients, etc.) for remote use of information and applications via the web or other browser based portal over any packet-based network. |
| US09521205B1 |
Analyzing changes in web analytics metrics
Methods, systems, and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on a computer storage medium, for analyzing changes in web analytics metrics. In one aspect, a method includes identifying a change in a web analytics metric for a website over a period of time, the web analytics metric being based at least in part on visitor data for the website over the period of time; computing a respective segment contribution score for each of a plurality of segments of the web analytics metric, wherein a segment contribution score for a particular segment is based at least in part on a comparison between a value of the web analytics metric and a value of the particular segment during the period of time; and identifying one or more of the plurality of segments as contributing to the change in the web analytics metric based on the respective segment contribution scores. |
| US09521203B2 |
Communication session processing
Measures for use in processing communication sessions in a telecommunications network are provided. Each communication session has a signaling path spanning a plurality of devices including one or more intermediate network devices and at least two endpoint devices, the signaling path comprising a plurality of signaling segments, each segment being between two devices in the plurality of devices. A first signaling message, comprising a first identifier associated with the communication session, is received via a first signaling segment for a communication session. At least part of the first identifier is transformed using a deterministic encryption algorithm to generate a second identifier. A second signaling message, comprising the second identifier, is transmitted via a second signaling segment for the communication session to associate the second identifier with the communication session. |
| US09521197B2 |
Utilizing data object storage tracking in a dispersed storage network
A method begins by a dispersed storage (DS) processing module dividing a very large data object into a plurality of data regions and generating a data object storage tracking table that includes sections for identifying one or more data regions that are available or unavailable for retrieval. The method continues with the DS processing module dividing a first data region into data segments and disperse storage error encoding the data segments to produce sets of encoded data slices. The method continues with the DS processing module sending DSN write requests regarding storing the sets of encoded data slices to storage units and when at least a write threshold number of write responses is received for each of the sets of encoded data slices, updating the data object storage tracking table to indicate that the first data region is available for retrieval. |
| US09521196B2 |
Methods, devices and systems for dynamically managing memberships in replicated state machines within a distributed computing environment
A computer-implemented method may comprise processing agreements received over a computer network at a first replicated state machine deployed on processes belonging to a first membership in an order defined by a first globally ordered set of agreements associated with the first membership; receiving an agreement to change membership that is configured to cause the first replicated state machine to be deployed on processes belonging to a second membership that is associated with a second globally ordered set of agreements; and processing the agreement to change membership at a point within the first globally ordered set of agreements. |
| US09521195B1 |
Wireless content loading
A method, system, and medium are provided for a computer system for downloading an application from a computing client onto a mobile information device through wireless telecommunications. An application is located from a multitude of resources available on the World Wide Web through the Internet. After an application is selected from a particular resource, it is uploaded onto the computing client. A web server receives this uploaded application by means of the Internet. Another server is used as an intermediate communications device to receive notification from the web server of the available uploaded application. This intermediate communications server notifies the mobile device by way of wireless telecommunications of a pending application that is ready for downloading onto the mobile device. The mobile device user downloads the application, which is also accomplished via wireless telecommunications. |
| US09521194B1 |
Nondeterministic value source
A technology is described for providing a nondeterministic value to computing instances executing an application as part of a high availability system. An example method may include receiving a request for a nondeterministic value at a physical host that hosts a first computing instance, where the request may be for an application executing on the first computing instance. A nondeterministic value may be obtained from a nondeterministic value source located on the physical host and provided to the application executing on the first computing instance. A second request from a second computing instance may be received at the physical host, where the second request may be associated with a copy of the application executing on the second computing instance. The nondeterministic value may then be identified in the computer memory of the physical host and provided to the second computing instance over a computer network. |
| US09521191B2 |
Computing device, method, and program for distributing computational load
A method for distributing load among interconnected computing devices, each computing device having a designated position in each dimension of an array of designated positions, the method comprising, individually, at one or more computing devices per position in a series of positions in one dimension of n-dimensions, in which one dimension and one direction is assigned as a load transfer direction, executing a process including: obtaining an indication of current capacity for additional load at each member of a group of computing devices from among the computing devices; transferring load from the executing computing device to a member of the group at which it is indicated that there is capacity for additional load; where membership of the group is restricted to a computing device on the load transfer direction side of the executing computing device in the one dimension. |
| US09521188B1 |
Scheduled execution of instances
Techniques are disclosed for a client-and-server architecture where the client makes scheduled execution of instances to the server. The server may then launch occurrences as indicated by one of these API calls at each of the scheduled times. The server may also implement operations to selectively execute particular occurrences, such as executing a new occurrence only when no other occurrences are still running. In other embodiments, the server may implement pricing information in a determination of whether to execute a particular occurrence. |
| US09521184B2 |
Efficient storage and retrieval of resources for rendering structured documents
In one embodiment, a method includes accessing local storage on a computing device to render a structured document. The structured document corresponds to a first domain or sub-domain and includes an inline-frame element that corresponds to a second domain or sub-domain. The local storage includes one or more first local-storage slots that are reserved for resources associated with the first domain or sub-domain and one or more second local-storage slots that are reserved for resources associated with the second domain or sub-domain. The method further includes loading one or more resources for rendering the structured document from the first local-storage slots and loading one or more resources for rendering the structured document from the second local-storage slots. |
| US09521179B2 |
Validation of live media stream based on predetermined standards
A method includes receiving at least one manifest file, playlists and video chunks for at least one channel of a live media stream. The method includes validating, by a processing device, the live media stream to ensure that the at least one manifest file, the playlists and the video chunks are available. Validating the live media stream includes determining whether the at least one live media stream complies with at least one predetermined standard. The method includes validating the live media stream to ensure that the files are not stale and live. The method also includes validating the live media stream to ensure that the video chunks are properly sequenced, and validating the live media stream based on Hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) headers for the video chunks to determine whether errors are received associated with the live video stream. |
| US09521178B1 |
Dynamic bandwidth thresholds
Dynamic bandwidth thresholds enable substantially uninterrupted transmission of a highest compatible bit rate of a stream of media from a host to a client via a network connection. The client may include one or more buffers for receiving the stream of media. Attributes including the geolocation information of the client, buffer activity, and a bandwidth of the network connection may be monitored to determine an alternative bit rate of the stream of media. Future streams of media may be served at the alternative bit rate to provide clients sharing one or more of the monitored attributes with the highest compatible bit rate based on the monitored attributes. |
| US09521177B2 |
Network-based adaptive rate limiting
An apparatus can include a session rate limit calculator and a rate limiter. The session rate limit calculator can be configured to compute a session rate limit for a given session of a plurality of active streaming media sessions based on state information for the given session and state information for a downstream bottleneck link to which the apparatus feeds the plurality of active streaming media sessions. The rate limiter can be configured to control downstream traffic for the given session based on the computed session rate limit and to provide corresponding rate-limited downstream traffic for the given session. |
| US09521175B2 |
Media tagging
Tagging techniques use user interface features such as face icons that can be manipulated by a variety of cursors to tag media items including but not limited to photos. Tagged items can be presented automatically in response to establishing network communications between two devices. |
| US09521169B2 |
SIP anchor points to populate common communication logs
The concept of a centralized communication log is provided. Anchor points, and specifically Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) anchor points, serve as a media and call control point that is established on a per-user basis which can then be leveraged by a communication log application. Such a communication log application is able to determine accurate and real-time communicant information for a communication session and populate a centralized communication log with the same. Such a communication log is, therefore, accurate with respect to multiple users in a system, highly available, and scaled horizontally. |
| US09521168B2 |
Method for managing records in an IMS network, and S-CSCF server implementing said method
A method and apparatus are provided for management of registrations in an IMS network. The method includes: creating, for a given public identity, at least two registration queues, each one being associated with a registration policy; receiving a registration message sent by a terminal having the public identity; and assigning one of the registration queues to the terminal on the basis of a field included in the message. |
| US09521165B2 |
Method of detecting potential phishing by analyzing universal resource locators
A method for detecting potential phishing URLs includes extracting a URL from a document, analyzing the URL context, and comparing the URL to stored trusted URLs and stored known phishing URLs. The URL context includes anchor text and surrounding content associated with the URL. The method further includes generating a phishing alert based on the comparing and the analyzing. |
| US09521164B1 |
Computerized system and method for detecting fraudulent or malicious enterprises
A computer system and method for determining the legitimacy of a website determines the presence of a relationship between a received website and at least one known illegitimate website. When such a relationship is detected, the received website is determined to be illegitimate and corresponding action may be taken. |
| US09521163B2 |
Communication device and communication control method in communication device
A system manager sets a port connected to a specific device (for example, a router device) among a plurality of ports of a switch device as a reliable port. If a packet is received in the reliable port, the switch device manages an IP address and a MAC address of the router device by a reliable port information table. When a packet is received from a port not set as the reliable port, the switch device refers to the reliable port information table. At this time, when the received packet is an address resolution packet having impersonated a router device, the switch device discards the packet without transmitting the packet, thereby preventing a cyber attack on a terminal. |
| US09521160B2 |
Inferential analysis using feedback for extracting and combining cyber risk information
Various embodiments of the present technology include methods of assessing risk of a cyber security failure in a computer network of an entity. Various embodiments also include automatically determining, based on the assessed risk, a change or a setting to at least one element of policy criteria of a cyber security policy, automatically recommending, based on the assessed risk, computer network changes to reduce the assessed risk, and providing one or more recommended computer network changes to reduce the assessed risk. Various embodiments further include enactment by the entity of at least one of the one or more of the recommended computer network changes to reduce the assessed risk to the entity, determining that the entity has enacted at least a portion of the recommended computer network changes, and in response, automatically reassessing the risk of a cyber security failure based on the enacted recommended computer network changes. |
| US09521158B2 |
Feature aggregation in a computer network
In one embodiment, a device determines that input data to a machine learning model sent from a plurality of source nodes to an aggregation node is causing network congestion. A set of one or more other nodes to perform aggregation of the machine learning model input data is selected. A type of aggregation to be performed by the set of one or more other nodes is also selected. The set of one or more other nodes is also instructed to perform the selected type of aggregation on the data sent from the source nodes. |
| US09521157B1 |
Identifying and assessing malicious resources
Methods, systems, and computer-readable media for analyzing and indicating network resources as potentially malicious are disclosed. Some aspects of the disclosure provide ways for threat-analyzing individuals and/or organizations to transmit information about potentially malicious resources in a safe manner. Users or computing devices may transmit non-resolvable “de-fanged” resource identifiers, which lessens the likelihood that the receiving computing device will download malicious data or applications from the resource. Some aspects disclosed herein provide ways to correctly and accurately “re-fang” the resource identifier for threat analysis of the resource, for example by selecting one or more re-fangers to apply and applying the re-fangers to the identifier. Data may be retrieved from the resource (for example via a headless or non-interactive browser), and the resource and/or resource identifier may be categorized as malicious. Indications of a resource as malicious may be transmitted to other computing devices to reduce or eliminate malicious activity. |
| US09521156B2 |
Method and product for providing a predictive security product and evaluating existing security products
A method, product and computer program product for effecting an Evolutionary Process on malware, the method including the steps of: (a) receiving a malware specimen; (b) generating variants of the malware specimen; (c) evaluating the variants and awarding each the variant a Fitness Score; (d) selecting the variants having at least a predefined the Fitness Score; and (e) using the selected variants as the malware specimens in step (a) from which to generate a new generation of the variants. |
| US09521154B2 |
Detecting suspicious network activity using flow sampling
Methods, media, and computing devices for network security can include receiving flow sampled network traffic from multiple network devices with a network monitoring computing device for network traffic among multiple computing devices, comparing source ports and destination ports in the flow sampled network traffic to a list of approved ports with the network monitoring computing device, and detecting suspicious network activity for flow sampled network traffic having a source port and a destination port exceptional to the list of approved ports with the network monitoring computing device. Alternatively, a suspicious network activity list can be maintained for flow sampled network traffic having source and destination ports exceptional to the list of approved ports. Alternatively, a network administrator can be alerted when a port is added to the suspicious network activity list in response to a total number of ports in the suspicious network activity list exceeding a threshold number. |
| US09521153B2 |
Platform trust extension
A system and method of providing a platform trust extension for an information handling system is disclosed herein. The platform trust extension receives a notification that an application is selected for installation or execution on an information handling system. The identify of the application or the source of the application is identified based upon a signature of the application. The platform trust extension determines whether the application or the source of the application is semi-trusted based upon the signature of the application. If the application is semi-trusted, the platform trust extension permits the application to run at an additional trust level. |
| US09521152B1 |
Utilization of multiple keypads for password inputs
A computer program product includes program instructions to generate a first virtual keypad for entry of a first portion of a password, wherein the first portion includes a first value and a second value. The program instructions receive the first portion, wherein the first portion includes a first number of keys selected equal to the first value and the second value present in the first number of keys selected. The program instructions generate a second virtual keypad for entry of a second portion, wherein the second portion includes a third and a fourth value. The program instructions receive the second portion, wherein the second portion includes a second number of keys selected equal to the third value and the fourth value present in the second number of keys selected. The program instructions determine to grant a user access to an account associated with the account password. |
| US09521151B2 |
Automated and policy driven optimization of cloud infrastructure through delegated actions
A system and method for optimizing a cloud environment using a workflow. |
| US09521148B2 |
Online portal access and management system utilizing multiple IP devices organized on a server application with multiple level restricted log-in and event logging
An on-line portal access and management system uses multiple ip devices organized on a server application with multiple level restricted log-in and event logging. The program with multiple connected IP devices allows the credentialed user to access and organize the capabilities of the multiple system connected IP devices through a single login portal. The IP devices operate equipment such as doors, gates, cameras, access control systems, VOIP intercoms, HVAC systems and other IP based systems typically found in multi-story buildings or multi building campuses. The IP devices generate data logged and archived to the IP device memory media or local data storage device. The application program sifts the IP device generated data for user important information and moves important IP device generated information to the server based memory and data files. |
| US09521147B2 |
Policy based application management
Improved techniques for managing enterprise applications on mobile devices are described herein. Each enterprise mobile application running on the mobile device has an associated policy through which it interacts with its environment. The policy selectively blocks or allows activities involving the enterprise application in accordance with rules established by the enterprise. Together, the enterprise applications running on the mobile device form a set of managed applications. Managed applications are typically allowed to exchange data with other managed applications, but are blocked from exchanging data with other applications, such as the user's own personal applications. Policies may be defined to manage data sharing, mobile resource management, application specific information, networking and data access solutions, device cloud and transfer, dual mode application software, enterprise app store access, and virtualized application and resources, among other things. |
| US09521146B2 |
Proof of possession for web browser cookie based security tokens
In one embodiment, a user device 110 may access a network service 122 using a secure cookie 300. A high trust process may create an authentication proof 360 using a secure key. The high trust process may provide a browsing token 310 and the authentication proof 360 to a low trust process to send to an authentication service 124. |
| US09521142B2 |
System and method for generating passwords using key inputs and contextual inputs
A method and system for automatically generating a new password from user selected characters via key press which are different from the user selected characters. Each key of a keypad can be entered within one or more contexts, manually selected by the user or automatically selected by the described system, such that the same key press within one context provides a unique code different than the same key press within another context. The code corresponding to the proper combination of a key press, the contexts of the selected key press, and the sequence of entry must match the previously stored code set by the user. Context selection is not based on any of the possible key presses selectable on the keypad. Therefore if the password characters are discovered without the context for each character, then it becomes difficult to access the content. The newly generated password can be the same length as the originally entered password, or can be longer or shorter in length than the originally entered password. |
| US09521141B2 |
Caller validation
A computer system supports a validation system that enables a business client to validate a business associate who has called the client using a pass phrase. The computer system manages one or more pass phrases that have been previously configured by the business client. The client can then challenge a caller (the purported business associate) with the phrase or keyword to make sure the caller is actually the authorized business associate before providing any sensitive information. Management of phrases and/or keywords may include a computer-executable process where in the client may set up phrases (for example, a challenge question and a corresponding answer) or keyword through an on-line application, telephone, e-mail or any other suitable communication mechanism. The business client may have an option to change, delete or create phrases and/or keywords at any time through appropriate security measures. |
| US09521140B2 |
Secure execution environment services
Techniques for managing secure execution environments provided as a service to computing resource service provider customers are described herein. A request to launch a secure execution environment is received from a customer and fulfilled by launching a secure execution environment on a selected computer system. The secure execution environment is then validated and upon a successful validation, one or more applications are provided to the secure execution environment to be executed within the secure execution environment. As additional requests relating to managing the secure execution environment are received, operations are performed based on the requests. |
| US09521134B2 |
Control apparatus in software defined network and method for operating the same
A control apparatus which manages a software defined network including a plurality of switches includes a security management module that authenticates at least one application program, and an application program management module that executes the authenticated application program among the at least one application program in a first process, and executes the application program whose authentication fails in a second process. The application program management module may be executed in the first process, and the first process may be different from the second process. |
| US09521128B2 |
Using a hash of a filename to control encoding/decoding of a digital file
Methods, devices, systems, and non-transitory process-readable storage media for a computing device to reversibly obfuscate contents of a digital file includes generating a binary string by applying a shared hash function to a public filename of the digital file. The method may include subdividing the digital file into a first plurality of data segments corresponding to one of a number of bits represented by the generated binary string and a file size of the digital file, shuffling the first plurality of data segments using a shared, looping shuffle algorithm. Each shuffling operation of the shared, looping shuffle algorithm may use a different bit of the generated binary string in a predefined first sequence. The shuffled first plurality of data segments may be combined to obtain a shuffled digital file. A reverse of the method may be performed to obtain the original digital file. |
| US09521125B2 |
Pseudonymous remote attestation utilizing a chain-of-trust
The present application is directed to pseudonymous attestation utilizing a chain of trust. An example prover device may include a chain-of-trust based on keys derived cryptographically from a shared symmetric key and pseudonymous identification data. The chain-of-trust may be used to cryptographically generate a pseudonymous public key and private key. The prover device may provide at least pseudonymous identification data and the pseudonymous public key to a verifier device. The verifier device may access pseudonymous data published by a certifier determine whether the prover device is authentic and includes known-good versions of software (e.g., sourced from the certifier). In this manner, the verifier device may be assured that the prover device is authentic without knowing the actual identity of the prover device. In at least one embodiment, the prover device may also include a trusted execution environment (TEE). |
| US09521121B2 |
Asset management via virtual tunnels
An asset management system is presented. The management system includes monitoring devices able to provide asset data across firewalls without requiring reconfiguration of the firewalls. The asset data pass through a forwarding service that instantiates a virtual tunnel comprising a communication channel between the monitoring devices and remote asset management engines. The asset management engines can also be located behind firewalls. As the management engines aggregate asset data, the engines can present one or more alerts via a management interface. |
| US09521112B2 |
Systems and methods of assigning and using virtual telephone numbers
A single virtual telephone number that is used to route telephony communications is assigned to first and second users if the first and second users rarely, if ever, communicate with the same party. When an incoming call is received on the virtual telephone number, telephony information for the first and second users is reviewed to determine if the calling party is one that has communicated with either of the first and second users in the past. If so, the telephony communication is routed to the user who has communicated with the calling party in the past. |
| US09521110B2 |
Method and system for handling a dynamic host configuration protocol internet protocol version 4 address release
Methods and apparatuses are provided for releasing an internet protocol (IP) address by a packet data network gateway (PGW) in a mobile communication system. The PGW allocates an IP version 4 (IPv4) address and an IP version 6 (IPv6) address to a terminal to establish a packet data network (PDN) connection between the terminal and the PGW. The PGW identifies a PDN type associated with the PDN connection if an event of releasing the IPv4 address has occurred. The PGW transmits, to a serving gateway (SGW), a binding revocation message, including information indicating release of the IPv4 address, with the PDN connection remaining, if the PDN type is IPv4 and IPv6. The PGW receives a binding revocation acknowledge message in response to the binding revocation request message, from the SGW. |
| US09521109B2 |
Systems, methods, and computer-readable media for allocation and renewal of IP addresses
Embodiments relate to methods, devices, and computer-implemented methods for internet protocol (“IP”) address assignment by a dynamic host configuration protocol (“DHCP”) server. The method includes receiving, from a client device, a DHCP discovery message for allocation of an IP address; assigning, by a processor, an IP address to the client device for a first lease period based on the DHCP discovery message; providing the IP address that was assigned to the client device; receiving, from the client device, an IP address lease renewal request during the first lease period; and renewing the first lease period to establish a second lease period that is longer than the first lease period based on a length of time the IP address that was assigned is in use by the client device. |
| US09521105B2 |
Sending communications to contacts on a social networking service
Sending communications to contacts on a social networking service includes receiving a target geographical location of a computing device, identifying a vicinity based on the target geographical location, using the vicinity to identify a set of contacts associated with an account on a social networking service, where the set of contacts are used to produce a contact list that excludes one or more contacts that are not associated with locations within the vicinity, and sending a communication to members of the contact list, where the communication relates to the target geographical location. |
| US09521104B2 |
Outgoing communications inventory
Systems and methods for generating and accessing a communications inventory are provided. To generate the inventory in one embodiment, a plurality of outgoing communications is received. The outgoing communications may have been auto-generated or generated as part of a batch process. Next, a determination is made that a first outgoing communication of the plurality of outgoing communications is unique relative to other outgoing communications to avoid storing duplicate messages. Lastly, a user may access a display of the first outgoing communication. |
| US09521100B2 |
Aggregate electronic mail message handling
Techniques for aggregating one or more electronic mail messages (e.g., a subscribed to email) are described, including receiving at an aggregating domain, electronic mail communicated from another domain, parsing the electronic mail to selectively extract content identifiers for content (e.g., text, images, audio, video, media) included in the electronic mail, generating a tile object from selectively extracted content identifiers, and displaying the tile object on a display grid for viewing by a subscriber (e.g., user) of one or more of the electronic mail messages. A plurality of tiles may be generated for a plurality of different email messages and the display grid may display all or a portion of the plurality of tiles. Electronic mail messages may include a subscription to the aggregating domain that was elected by a user as an option presented by a publisher of a unsubscribe page in response to the user's unsubscribe request. |
| US09521097B2 |
System and method for management of persistent and irrefutable instant messages
The present disclosure includes systems and methods for providing instant messaging communication between users via a communication network. Instant messaging clients are executed at user devices of a first and second user. A data message is transmitted from the instant messaging client at the user device of the first user to the instant messaging client at the user device of the second user, the data message having a content portion and at least one associated attribute that is cryptographically generated. The cryptographic attribute plus any additional first user attributes irrefutably binds the ID of the first user to the message information content to form an irrevocable message. The availability of at least one user-selectable function by the instant messaging client at the user device of the second user is controllable, based on the at least one associated attribute. |
| US09521095B2 |
Transport system and transport apparatus
It is provided a transport apparatus including: a port information management unit for obtaining port information which includes a type first interfaces, a transport rate of first interfaces, and a physical lane count from the first interfaces into the transport apparatus, and for determining, based on the obtained port information, a virtual lane count into which the physical lanes from the first interfaces are converted; virtual lane creating units for setting as many virtual lanes as the determined virtual lane count; a lane information creating unit for creating, based on the port information, lane information which associates the first interfaces, the physical lane count, and identification information of virtual lanes in association with the physical lanes; and a multiplexing unit for multiplexing data that is transported along the virtual lanes, and for inserting the lane information in an invalid data field which is generated when the data is multiplexed. |
| US09521092B2 |
Transport system and transport method
A transport system comprises 2 apparatuses. The first transport apparatus notifies, for each of first physical ports, to the second transport apparatus, a valid first lane count and identification information of the first physical port. The second transport apparatus is configured to: obtain, for each of second physical ports, a valid second lane count and identification information of the second physical port; associate, based on the valid second lane count and the identification information of the second physical port, and the valid first lane count and the identification information of the first physical port, the identification information of the first and second physical port; and transmit, when data including identification information of one of the first physical ports is transmitted, the data from the second physical port that is identified by the identification information associated with the identification information of the one of the first physical ports. |
| US09521090B2 |
Authorizing stations into a centrally managed network
Systems and methods for connecting new stations to a secure network. New stations can send connection requests to a headend device. The headend device can retrieve a device access key associated with the new station and can provide a network membership key to the new station based upon authentication of the new station using the device access key. |
| US09521086B2 |
Queue scheduling method and apparatus
Embodiments of the present invention disclose a queue scheduling method and apparatus, which can not only implement scheduling of a large number of queues, but also ensure that the queues uniformly send service data. The method includes: determining whether service data exists in each to-be-scheduled data queue and determining whether the to-be-scheduled data queues are allowed to send data; if it is determined that the service data exists in the to-be-scheduled data queues and the to-be-scheduled data queues are allowed to send data, placing queue marks of the to-be-scheduled data queues into a mark queue; scheduling queue marks of the to-be-scheduled data queues from the mark queue in sequence, scheduling the to-be-scheduled data queues corresponding to the queue marks, and enabling the to-be-scheduled data queues corresponding to the queue marks to send service data not exceeding predetermined data amounts. |
| US09521085B1 |
Policy-based bandwidth allocation
In one aspect, a method includes filtering one or more available ports on a data storage system to determine candidate ports based on at least their hardware redundancy information. The data storage system includes one or more data storage volumes. The method also includes allocating one or more ports to the data storage volume from the candidate ports based on parameters to enable communication from a host, using the one or more allocated ports, to the data storage volume through the one or more storage components. The parameters include at least one of a maximum paths parameter, a paths per initiator parameter and a minimum paths parameter. |
| US09521082B2 |
Methods and devices for creating, compressing and searching binary tree
Methods and devices for creating, compressing and searching a binary tree are provided by the present disclosure, which relates to the field of traffic classification. Binary tree compression includes: determining a number of a compression layer or a number of an intermediate node, compressing a binary tree according to the number of the compression layer or the number of the intermediate node to form at least one compression node, and creating a bitmap of the compression node. Therefore, the depth of the decision tree is reduced, the search speed is increased, rule expansion is avoided, and rule replication is reduced. |
| US09521079B2 |
Packet forwarding between packet forwarding elements in a network device
A network device having a plurality of packet forwarding elements, each including a hardware component for receiving and forwarding data packets from and to other network devices via a plurality of input ports connected to a network. Each hardware component is configured to determine whether a received data packet is one of a predetermined class of data packets based on data in the received data packet and, if so, generate expedited processing instructions corresponding to the received data packet based on data in the received data packet. The hardware component forwards the received data packet, together with the corresponding expedited processing instructions, directly to the hardware component of all packet forwarding elements of the plurality of packet forwarding elements for processing based on the expedited processing instructions. |
| US09521075B2 |
Communication device and communication control method
A communication device is included in an ad hoc network in a reactive routing scheme. The communication device includes a receiving unit, a selecting unit, and a transfer control unit. The receiving unit receives a route request frame including overall quality information on routes through which the route request frame has passed. The selecting unit selects a route request frame to be transferred to another communication device based on the quality information, from the route request frames received by the receiving unit through a plurality of routes. The transfer control unit transfers the route request frame selected by the selecting unit to the another communication device, and discards the route request frame when a quality value indicated by the quality information of the route request frame is smaller than a predetermined reference value. |
| US09521073B2 |
Enhanced fine-grained overlay transport virtualization multi-homing using per-network authoritative edge device synchronization
In some embodiments, edge devices associated with a network segment are identified. One of the devices is elected as an authoritative device and any previous authoritative devices are instructed to halt forwarding network traffic to an overlay network. |
| US09521071B2 |
Federation of controllers management using packet context
In a network control system, a method for managing traffic flow in a distributed controller environment includes stamping a packet to be forwarded between data forwarding units with flow control information based on an action set associated with a flow entry pushed by a logical controller. The packet is stamped by one or more of the data forwarding units. The flow control information is used to forward the packet between data forwarding units, thereby defining a datapath packet flow. |
| US09521067B2 |
System and methods for improved network routing
Known intra-domain routing methods (e.g., OSPF and IS-IS) are link-state routing protocols with hop-by-hop forwarding that sacrifice optimal traffic engineering for ease of implementation and management. Known optimal traffic engineering procedures are either not link-state methods or require source routing—characteristics that make them difficult to implement. Certain embodiments of the present invention include a fully distributed, adaptive, link-state routing protocol with hop-by-hop forwarding configured to achieve optimal traffic engineering. Such embodiments facilitate significant performance improvements relative to known intra-domain routing methods and decrease network infrastructure requirements. |
| US09521065B1 |
Enhanced VLAN naming
Providing unique VLAN names in a system containing a plurality of networks includes obtaining, for at least one of the networks, a unique identifier associated with each of the networks, obtaining a VLAN ID for at least one of the VLANs in the at least one of the networks, and forming a unique VLAN name by concatenating the unique identifier to the VLAN ID. The unique identifier may be associated with each of the networks is a root bridge ID for a root bridge associated with each of the networks. In response to a root bridge becoming non-operational, a new root bridge may be determined and the unique VLAN name may be changed to remove the old root bridge ID and to include the new root bridge ID. In response to a change in topology, a new root bridge may be determined. |
| US09521058B2 |
Multi-wire signaling with matched propagation delay among wire pairs
In a multi-wire channel that includes at least three wires, each unique wire pair of the multi-wire channel has approximately the same signal propagation time. In this way, jitter can be mitigated in the multi-wire channel for signaling where, for a given data transfer, a differential signal is transmitting on a particular pair of the wires and every other wire is floating. In some implementations, matching of the signal propagation times involves providing additional delay for at least one of the wires. The additional delay is provided using passive signal delay techniques and/or active signal delay techniques. |
| US09521052B1 |
Methods, systems, and computer readable mediums for utilizing application programming interfaces for accessing key performance indicator information
Methods, systems, and computer readable mediums for implementing an attribute into a network system are disclosed. According to one method, the method includes collecting raw data from a network node and defining a performance indicator definition associated with the collected raw data. The method can also include integrating the performance indicator definition into an attribute monitoring entity, and injecting the entity into a repository during system runtime. |
| US09521050B2 |
Method of and device for service monitoring and service monitoring management
The invention relates to a method of and device for service monitoring and a method of and device for service monitoring management. In particular the invention relates to a method of and device for service monitoring of at least one service, and of at least one sub-service associated with the service in which values for service monitoring metric and sub-service monitoring metrics derived from the terminal operational information are monitored and recorded. One or more service monitoring reports, containing service monitoring metric values and sub-service monitoring metric values that are relationally organized to reflect the association between the sub-service and the service, are sent. The invention also relates to a method of and device for service monitoring management in which one or more service monitoring reports, having service monitoring metric values and sub-service monitoring metric values that are relationally organized to reflect the association between the sub-service and the service, are received and stored. The received service monitoring metric values and sub-service monitoring metric values are analyzed with reference to the association between the service and the sub-service to perform service monitoring management. The service monitoring of the claimed invention may be carried out in a terminal or in a proxy or agent service monitoring device. |
| US09521049B2 |
Method and systems for an incoming unidirectional outage bypass for a voice over internet protocol private branch exchange system
A system and method are disclosed herein for providing a unidirectional outage bypass for incoming communications via a hosted Voice-over Internet Protocol (VoIP) private branch exchange (PBX) system to a session initiation protocol (SIP) device. An outage monitoring system is in communication with both the unidirectional bypass system and one or more bypass enablers that act at the direction of the unidirectional bypass system. The outage monitoring system detects outages and overloads, as well as, network failures between network components, the VoIP PBX, Client Devices and the public switched telephone network (PSTN). The unidirectional bypass system, in response to detection of an outage, determines error-handling procedures for the unidirectional bypass based on bypass configuration data. The bypass enablers forward incoming communications between the PSTN and a bypass destination following a bypass route in accordance the error-handling procedures, by bypassing components that are currently experiencing failures or overloads. |
| US09521045B1 |
Management of decommissioned server assets in a shared data environment
Embodiments of the present invention provide systems and methods for monitoring decommissioned servers in a shared data environment. Embodiments of the present invention can be used to aggregate information associated with an environment from external resources, and calculate a baseline of server activity from the aggregated information. When new information is received, it is compared to the baseline of server activity in order to determine a possible misuse of the server assets, when inconsistencies are detected between the baseline of activity and the new information. |
| US09521044B2 |
Systems and methods for discovering devices in a neighborhood aware network
Methods, devices, and computer program products communicating discovery information in a wireless neighborhood aware network (NAN). One method includes receiving a message from a neighboring wireless device. The message includes an identifier associated with the neighboring wireless device. The method further includes adding the identifier to a data structure indicative of discovered device identifiers. The method further includes transmitting a message including the data structure indicative of discovered device identifiers. |
| US09521041B2 |
Apparatus, system, and method ordering and provisioning variable bandwidth capacity on a network
Systems and methods for automatic purchasing, reserving and/or provisioning of a wavelength bandwidth block are disclosed. A user may access a web page, such as an interactive web-portal, to provide bandwidth data and corresponding ordering information for reserving a particular amount of bandwidth capacity on a telecommunications network. Subsequently, the customer's may access and the bandwidth blocks to increase/decrease and/or activate/deactivate portions of the reserved bandwidth capacity as needed. |
| US09521040B2 |
System and method for generic configuration management system application programming interface
The technology disclosed can query configuration management system data and includes cross table selection criteria and joined data return. |
| US09521024B2 |
Device of crest factor reduction
The present disclosure provides a device (300) of crest factor reduction for a multi-carrier signal. The device (300) includes: a peak detector (320) adapted to receive a sampled representation of the multi-carrier signal, detect a peak from the sampled representation and obtain a value and a time domain location of a cancellation peak for cancelling the peak; a plurality of peak cancellation signal generators (330) each corresponding to a carrier of the multi-carrier signal and adapted to generate a peak cancellation signal within a frequency band of its corresponding carrier based on the value and time domain location of the cancellation peak; and a subtractor (350) adapted to subtract the peak cancellation signals from the sampled representation after being delayed. The present disclosure also provides another device of crest factor reduction, a multi-stage crest factor reduction circuit and a peak detector. |
| US09521020B2 |
Data packet processing for estimation of a direction towards a transmitter
It is disclosed to insert an anti-whitened data block, which is obtainable from a specific data block by anti-whitening, into a data block that is to be whitened by a whitening to yield a whitened data block, wherein the anti-whitening compensates the whitening so that the whitened data block will comprise the specific data block in non-whitened form. It is further disclosed to output, in a first operating mode, an output data block generated by one of whitening and de-whitening an input data block in its entirety, and outputting, in a second operating mode, one of: an output data block generated by one of whitening and de-whitening all parts of an input data block under exclusion of a specific data block contained in the input data block. |
| US09521017B2 |
Diversity reception device, diversity reception method, reception program, and recording medium
The present invention calculates an echo profile on the basis of: a complex baseband signal generated in a front end (2#b) on the basis of a received signal transmitted by an antenna (1#b); and a transmission symbol estimated value (dfin) supplied by a trellis decoder (8). With the estimated transmission symbol (dfin) as a filter input, the echo profile is calculated on the basis of a filter coefficient of an adaptive filter having a received signal as the desired filter-output signal. On the basis of the calculated echo profile, a sampling-frequency control unit (10) controls the sampling frequency of the baseband signal in the front end (2#b). As a result, it is possible to perform a highly accurate timing-recovery control. |
| US09521015B2 |
Dynamic insertion of a quality enhancement gateway
Methods, systems, and computer readable media for enhancing media quality by dynamically inserting a quality enhancement gateway are disclosed. According to one method, steps are performed at a service node. The method includes detecting a condition associated with a session between two endpoints that indicates that the session could benefit from media quality enhancement processing. The method also includes signaling the endpoints to route at least a portion of the session through a quality enhancement gateway (QEG) capable of providing the media quality enhancement processing for the session. |
| US09521013B2 |
Tracking significant topics of discourse in forums
Users in public forums often mention certain topics in the course of their discussions. Member's comments in messages to other members are analyzed to obtain terms that co-occur with topics. Frequencies of co-occurrence of a term with topics are normalized based on frequency of the term in a random sample of message. The terms are ranked by their normalized frequency of co-occurrence with a topic in messages. The top terms are selected based on their rank. Analysis of demographic information associated with members that mentioned top terms associated with a topic is displayed in graphical format that highlights the relationship between the age, gender, and usage of the top terms over time. The demographic information presented includes average age of members that mentioned a top term or their gender information within a selected time interval. |
| US09521010B2 |
Diagnosing and reporting a network break
A system, method, and computer readable medium allow a cable break or other network link failure to be detected and reported. The method may include steps of periodically transmitting a packet from a root node in the network to a next node in the network; at each successive non-root node in the loop, manipulating the packet and forwarding the manipulated packet to a next successive node in the loop; when the packet is received back at the root node within a predetermined time period, reporting that the loop is intact; and when the packet is not received back at the root node within the predetermine time period, reporting that a network break has occurred. The network may conform to the STP or RSTP protocols, and may contain one or more rings possibly including dual rings. The PLC may operate as the root node, and the reporting may be done at an application level in the PLC. |
| US09521004B2 |
Methods and systems of generating a billing feed of a distributed network
A system and methods are provided for generating a billing feed for a distributed network system and reselling resources of the distributed network system. In one embodiment, a method includes observing a plurality of messages sent and received among components of the distributed network system, generating a call flow graph based on the plurality of messages of the distributed network system, and outputting a billing feed for the distributed network based on the call flow graph, to provide a billing feed including one or more billable events. billable events may be are based on one or more of received requests, underlying resource usage, time of usage, scope of usage. In this regard, the system may provide for one or more models of reselling resources of a distributed network system. |
| US09521003B2 |
Multicarrier transmission system with low power sleep mode and rapid-on capability
A multicarrier transceiver is provided with a sleep mode in which it idles with reduced power consumption when it is not needed to transmit or receive data. The full transmission and reception capabilities of the transceiver are quickly restored when needed, without requiring the full (and time-consuming) initialization commonly needed to restore such transceivers to operation after inactivity. |
| US09520999B2 |
Systems and methods for identifying an individual
The present application relates to systems and methods using biometric data of an individual for identifying the individual and/or verifying the identity of an individual. These systems and methods are useful for, amongst many applications, more secure identification of high-risk individuals attempting to gain access to an entity, transport, information, location, security organization, law enforcement organization, transaction, services, authorized status, and/or funds. |
| US09520998B2 |
System and method for recovery key management
A system and method for managing the recovery key of a computer system is disclosed. The computer system includes a security layer, and the recovery key is stored locally to a memory location on the computer system, including, as examples, flash memory on the motherboard of the computer system or a USB port on the computer system. In operation, when it becomes necessary for the computer system to authenticate the recovery key, the recovery key may be retrieved from the local memory. The retrieval and storage of the recovery key may be managed by a remote administrator. The recovery key may be stored in a hidden partition in the storage location, and the recovery key may be cryptographically wrapped to add an additional layer of security. |
| US09520997B2 |
Device, method, and medium for facility management verification
An equipment manager manages the operating state of equipment. A user verification processor performs user verification according to a request from a monitoring terminal, and when user verification is successful, generates for each facility management device a verification code in which verification data, to which a digital signature has been added using a self-owned secret key, has been encoded using a public key of each facility management device, and transmits the verification codes to the monitoring terminal. After receiving the verification code, a verification code analyzer decodes the verification code using the self-owned secret key, and performs verification by verifying the digital signature using the public key of a representative facility management device. When verification is successful, a Web server is able to monitor and manipulate data that indicates the operating states of all of the equipment that is managed by the equipment manager. |
| US09520992B2 |
Logical-to-physical address translation for a removable data storage device
A method for making memory more reliable involves accessing data stored in a removable storage device by translating a logical memory address provided by a host digital device to a physical memory address in the device. A logical memory address is received from the host digital device. The logical memory address corresponds to a location of data stored on the removable storage device. A physical memory address corresponding to the local address is determined by accessing a lookup table corresponding to the logical zone. |
| US09520987B2 |
Systems and methods for timing recovery in near-field communication
A method for inductively-coupled communications is described. The method includes receiving a signal. The method also includes analyzing the signal to estimate a symbol timing error. Estimating the symbol timing error may include comparing a location of a pause, a low-to-high or a high-to-low transition in the received signal with an ideal location of a pause or a transition. The method further includes adjusting symbol timing to correct for the symbol timing error. |
| US09520980B1 |
Methods and systems for using air-interface resource information in routing prioritization
Disclosed herein is a method carried out by a router. The method includes the router receiving a data packet originated by a wireless communication device (WCD) being served by a base station. The method also includes the router determining an air-interface resource on which the base station is serving the WCD. After receiving the data packet, the router determines a routing prioritization for the data packet based at least in part on the determined air-interface resource. The router may then route the data packet in accordance with the determined routing prioritization. |
| US09520979B2 |
Method and apparatus for transmitting and receiving data
Disclosed are a method and an apparatus for transmitting and receiving data. A method for transmitting an uplink comprises the steps of: a terminal determining the size of an ACK/NACK payload according to a transmission mode of a first serving cell and a transmission mode of a second serving cell; the terminal establishing a transmission power for transmitting the ACK/NACK payload based on the size of the ACK/NACK payload; and the terminal transmitting the ACK/NACK payload through a physical uplink control channel (PUCCH) based on the transmission power. |
| US09520973B2 |
Method for transmitting reference signal to antenna port in wireless access system
The present invention provides various methods for transmitting a channel state information reference signal (CSI-RS) by varying a transmission period for each antenna port or antenna port group, and also provides apparatuses supporting the methods. The method for receiving a CSI-RS in a wireless access system according to one aspect of the present invention may comprise the steps of: receiving a CSI-RS component information element for setting CSI-RS transmission periods for two or more antenna ports to be mutually different; receiving CSI-RSs for each of the two or more antenna ports based on the CSI-RS component information element; and acquiring channel state information for each of the two or more antenna ports based on the received CSI-RS. |
| US09520972B2 |
Pilot signal transmission for an orthogonal frequency division wireless communication system
Transmission patterns for pilot symbols transmitted from a mobile station or base station are provided. The pattern allows for improved receipt of the pilot symbols transmitted. In addition, schemes for improving the ability to multiplex pilot symbols without interference and/or biasing from different mobile stations over the same frequencies and in the same time slots. |
| US09520967B2 |
Carrier aggregation acknowledgement bits
Systems, methods, and user equipment can involve transmitting Acknowledgement/Negative Acknowledgement (ACK/NACK) bits for carrier aggregation between a first cell and a second cell in a User Equipment (UE). With the UE, for a sub-frame, a first number of ACK/NACK bits for the first cell can be compared with a second number of ACK/NACK bits for the second cell. If a first number of ACK/NACK bits for the first cell is less than a second number of ACK/NACK bits for the second cell, an ACK/NACK bit position from the first cell can be used to transmit an ACK/NACK bit for the second cell. In some implementations, one or more DTX bits can be used to set the number of ACK/NACK bits in the first cell equal to the number of ACK/NACK bits in the second cell. |
| US09520964B2 |
Method for reporting channel information based on link adaptation in wireless local area network and the apparatus for the same
A method and a device for reporting a modulation and coding scheme (MCS) feedback in a wireless local area network are provided. A responding station receives, from a requesting station, a requesting Physical layer Protocol Data Unit (PPDU) for requesting a MCS feedback via a plurality of spatial streams. A recommended MCS is estimated under an assumption that the requesting station will transmit at least one first spatial stream among the plurality of spatial streams used for the requesting PPDU, The responding station transmits, to the requesting station, the MCS feedback including a recommended MCS field indicating the recommended MCS and a recommended stream field indicating a number of at least one recommended spatial stream. A number of the at least one first spatial stream used for estimating the recommended MCS is equal to the number of the at least one recommended spatial stream. |
| US09520960B2 |
Optical multiplex level and optical channel layer server trails in wavelength switched optical networks
An optical network packet configured to transmit over an optical communication link from a first optical network having a first control plane to a second optical network having a second control plane is generated. Generating the optical network packet comprises generating the packet configured to be transmitted from the first optical network to the second optical network in the optical domain. |
| US09520958B2 |
Transmission angle control device, base station, transmission angle control method, and program
A transmission angle control device in a wireless communication system based on a TDD scheme includes: an interference signal detection unit that detects a level of interference on a second base station caused by a signal transmitted by a first base station based on a received signal received from the second base station and that outputs the interference level as an interference information signal; and a transmission angle determining unit that adjusts a transmission angle of a signal transmitted by the first base station in a vertical direction according to the interference information signal. |
| US09520957B2 |
Group recognition and profiling
A system can include storage for identification data for individuals; an interface configured to receive image data; recognition circuitry configured to recognize individuals using received image data and stored identification data; grouping circuitry configured to define groups based on recognized individuals; assignment circuitry configured to assign media consumption preferences to defined groups; and output circuitry configured to output preferred media information based on assigned media consumption preferences of a defined group of recognized individuals. Various other apparatuses, systems, methods, etc., are also disclosed. |
| US09520955B2 |
Detection apparatus and detection method for received signal strength indicator
Embodiments of the present invention provide a detection method including receiving a modulated signal data stream from a microwave transmit end, performing amplification on the modulated signal data stream according to an amplification control signal, where the amplification control signal is used to indicate the number of amplification times for the amplification performed on the modulated signal data stream, performing analog-to-digital conversion on the amplified modulated signal data stream to obtain a first digital signal data stream; filtering the first digital signal data stream, performing power detection on the first digital signal data stream to obtain a first average power value, performing power detection on a filtered first digital signal data stream to obtain a second average power value, obtaining the amplification control signal according to the first average power value, and obtaining an RSSI value by calculation according to the amplification control signal and the second average power value. |
| US09520944B2 |
Optical communication device
An optical communication device includes an optical fiber, two chips, a light emitter, a photoelectric conversion device, and a circuit board. The chips includes a substrate, and a polarizing beam splitter positioned on the substrate, the polarizing beam splitter includes a first coupling device, second coupling device, a Y-waveguide, and a TM filter coupling to the third channel. The chips, the light emitter, and the photoelectric conversion device are coupled to the circuit board, the light emitter, and the photoelectric conversion device are connected electrically with the circuit board. |
| US09520939B2 |
Methods and apparatus for using visible light communications for controlling access to an area
Methods and apparatus for controlling access to secure areas are described. Time varying values are generated from access device identifiers, e.g., door identifiers. The time varying value, e.g., a hashed door identifier value, is transmitted as a VLC signal by a luminaire near the door to which the hashed identifier corresponds. A mobile detects the transmitted hashed door identifier value and sends an access request via a wireless signal, e.g., a radio signal. The access request includes a value generated from the received hashed door identifier and a mobile device identifier. A control device determines, from information in the access request and stored information indicating which mobile devices have authority to access which doors, if access should be granted to the door corresponding to the hashed access device identifier from which the received information was generated. The received information may be hash of the mobile identifier and hashed door identifier. |
| US09520937B2 |
Radio communication system
In a radio communication system a first radio station performs communication by the use of a first radio signal. A second radio station receives a second radio signal which is indistinguishable from the first radio signal. A third radio station is in a radio communication area of the first radio station and a radio communication area of the second radio station. A communication format conversion unit generates a third radio signal by converting a communication format of the second radio signal to a communication format which is distinguishable from the first radio signal, and communicates with the third radio station by the use of the third radio signal. |
| US09520936B2 |
Method of updating BS system information of a relay station in a broadband wireless access system
A method for efficiently updating system information of a base station at a relay station of a broadband wireless access system and an apparatus for performing the method are disclosed. The method for updating system information of an advanced base station (ABS) at an advanced relay station (ARS) of a broadband wireless access system comprises receiving a first message, which includes changed information of the system information of the base station, from the base station; transmitting a second message for acknowledgment of the first message to the base station; and performing application for the changed information. |
| US09520921B2 |
Network of electronic devices assembled on a flexible support and communication method
An embodiment of a network of electronic devices is formed on a flexible substrate by a plurality of electronic devices assembled on the flexible substrate. The electronic devices have an embedded antenna for mutual coupling of a wireless type. Each electronic device is formed by a chip or a complex system integrating a transceiver circuit coupled to the embedded antenna and a functional part coupled to the transceiver circuit and including at least one element chosen in the group comprising: a sensor, an actuator, an interface, an electrode, a memory, a control unit, a power-supply unit, a converter, an adapter, a digital circuit, an analog circuit, an RF circuit, a microelectromechanical system, an electrode, a well, a cell, a container for liquids. The flexible support may be a substrate of plastic material that incorporates the electronic devices or a garment having smart buttons that house the electronic devices. |
| US09520920B2 |
Transmitting and receiving digital and analog signals across an isolator using amplitude modulation
Various embodiments of systems for transmitting and receiving a plurality of signals across an isolation material are disclosed. In one embodiment, a first signal may be modulated into a first modulated signal. The first modulated signal is then modulated into a second modulated signal in accordance to a second signal using amplitude modulation. In another embodiment, a first signal and a second signal are modulated into a modulated signal before being modulated further using amplitude modulation. The detection of the modulated signal may be performed using a frequency detector and an amplitude detection circuit that are arranged in parallel. At least some of the apparatuses, circuits, systems and methods disclosed herein may be implemented using conventional CMOS design and manufacturing techniques to provide, for example, at least one or more integrated circuits. |
| US09520918B2 |
Login via near field communication with automatically generated login information
Methods and devices for NFC tap login with automatically-generated login information are disclosed. A user can launch a browser application and log in a desired website without having to enter the user's username and password. The user can achieve this by tapping a Near Field Communication-enabled computing device with an NFC-enabled wireless device. The wireless device generates and stores the user's usernames and passwords corresponding to a number of websites, and provides the username and password for the desired website to the computing device via an NFC-based communication link. Through a browser application running on the computing device, the user can sign up an account at and log in the desired website. |
| US09520910B1 |
Receiver component and method for enhancing a detection range of a time-tracking process in a receiver
A receiver component and a method for enhancing a detection range of a time synchronization process in a receiver utilize multiple cross-correlations of a received signal with a known preamble sequence. The results of the multiple cross-correlations are divided into delay segments. The delay segments of one of the multiple cross-correlations are compared with the delay segments of another of the multiple cross-correlations to determine delay of the delay segments of the one of the multiple cross-correlation results. |
| US09520907B2 |
Methods and apparatus for envelope tracking system
A communication unit comprises a radio frequency, RF, transmitter comprising: a power amplifier, PA, module; an envelope tracking system operably coupled to the PA module and arranged to variably control a supply voltage for the PA module; and a load control system operably coupled to an output of the PA module and arranged to control a power amplifier output load. |
| US09520904B2 |
Apparatus and method for high linearity tuning
A system that incorporates teachings of the subject disclosure may include, for example, a plurality of variable capacitors, a first set of resistors for applying a bias voltage to each variable capacitor of the plurality of capacitors, and a second set of resistors for providing a DC ground to each variable capacitor of the plurality of capacitors. The system can include one or more of multiple bias points, anti-parallel diodes, a choke inductor or a ground inductor. Other embodiments are disclosed. |
| US09520902B2 |
Reader and RFID reader
A reader is provided, including a power amplifier (PA), a low-noise amplifier (LNA), a circulator, an auto-tuning matching network, and a control circuit. The PA emits a first RF transmission signal. The LNA transmits a first RF induced signal corresponding to the first RF transmission signal. The circulator is coupled between the PA and LNA, transmits the first RF transmission signal to an RF connection terminal or receives the first RF induced signal from the RF connection terminal. The auto-tuning matching network is coupled to the circulator, matches impedances between the circulator and the RF connection terminal. The control circuit is coupled to the auto-tuning matching network, adjusts the auto-tuning matching network to match impedances between the circulator and the RF connection terminal. |
| US09520896B1 |
Non-transitory computer-readable recording medium, encoding method, encoding device, decoding method, and decoding device
An information processing device compares a particular unit including a plurality of words and each word corresponding to an encoded output previously output to an output buffer, when encoding an input text word by word and outputting the encoded input text to an output buffer, detects a duplicating part that includes the particular unit and performs dynamic encoding on the detected part to replace the detected part with a dynamic code. |
| US09520895B2 |
Low power analog to digital converter
Described is an analog to digital converter (ADC) which comprises: a sigma-delta modulator to receive an analog signal, the sigma-delta modulator operable to perform chopping to cancel common-mode noise; and one or more counters coupled to the sigma-delta modulator to generate a digital code representative of the analog signal. |
| US09520894B1 |
Signal encoding and compression with dynamic downsampling
A signal encoding and compression system with dynamic downsampling may include an encoder module configured to decimate a first digital signal, thereby producing a second digital signal. Each signal may then be DPCM-encoded. Decision logic may then be used to determine which encoded signal to provide as an output, based on a characteristic of the original signal. |
| US09520893B1 |
Architecture for ensuring monotonicity in a digital-to-analog converter
A current-mode, digital-to-analog converter (DAC) configured to convert a digital word input having j bits to an analog signal. The DAC has 2j current sources, an output node, a current divider, a first switch, and a second switch. Each of the 2j current sources is configured to produce a current having a value I0. The current divider has a programmable divide ratio, d, where 1/d is between 0 and 1. The first switch is configured to selectively couple 2j−1 of the 2j current sources to the output node. One of the 2j current sources is not coupled to the output node. The second switch is configured to selectively couple each of the 2j current sources to the current divider. This architecture ensures that the fundamental transform of input code to output current always has a slope that does not change from positive to negative or from negative to positive. |
| US09520889B2 |
Apparatus and method for combining multiple charge pumps in phase locked loops
A frequency synthesizer includes circuitry configured to generate two or more feedback clocks based on the oscillation signals output from a voltage-controlled oscillator. The circuitry also modulates the feedback clocks based on fractional offsets from a reference clock frequency for input into two or more phase and frequency detectors. Multiple charge pump circuits receive inputs from these phase and frequency detectors. The current from these charge pumps is summed and input to a low pass filter. The output of the filter represents an average of the time difference between the reference clock and the multiple feedback clocks. |
| US09520888B1 |
Integrated circuit device with on-board calibration of signal generator circuits, and related methods
An integrated circuit (IC) device can include at least one phase or delay lock loop (P/DLL) circuit comprising a plurality of circuit sections, at least one of the circuit sections responsive to digital calibration values to alter at least one periodic output signal; a nonvolatile memory (NVM) circuit formed in the same IC package as the at least one P/DLL circuit and configured to store the calibration values; and a processing circuit formed in the same IC package as the at least one P/DLL circuit and the NVM circuit, the processing circuit configured to generate the calibration values in response to target values and output values from the at least one P/DLL circuit, and to store the calibration values in the NVM circuit. |
| US09520887B1 |
Glitch free bandwidth-switching scheme for an analog phase-locked loop (PLL)
Certain aspects of the present disclosure provide techniques and apparatus for glitch-free bandwidth switching in a phase-locked loop (PLL). One example PLL generally includes a voltage-controlled oscillator (VCO) comprising a first variable capacitive element and a second variable capacitive element and a bandwidth adjustment circuit comprising a first switch in parallel with a resistor of a resistor-capacitor (RC) network. The bandwidth adjustment circuit is configured to open the first switch for a first bandwidth mode, close the first switch in a transition from the first bandwidth mode to a second bandwidth mode, and control a capacitance of the second variable capacitive element based on a voltage of a node of the RC network. |
| US09520881B1 |
Systems and methods for tuning an oscillator frequency
A system for tuning an oscillator frequency. The system includes a trimmed calibration circuit comprising a comparator and trimmed delay element and calibration logic. The calibration logic is configured to receive an output of the comparator and control an on time and an off time of an oscillator based on the output of the comparator. |
| US09520880B2 |
Configurable analog front ends for circuits with substantially gate enclosed inner electrode MOSFET switch
A configurable integrated circuit (IC) includes a substrate having a semiconductor surface that the IC is formed within and thereon. The IC includes a configurable Analog Front End (cAFE) including at least one circuit module or input/output (IO), an analog switch having at least a first substantially gate enclosed Metal Oxide Semiconductor Field Effect Transistor (SGEFET) having a gate stack including a gate on a gate dielectric, a source, and a drain. The drain or source is a substantially gate enclosed (SGE) inner electrode relative to the gate, and the other of the source and the drain is outside the gate. The inner electrode of the first SGEFET is directly coupled to an analog bus. A switch control provides control signals to at least the gate of the first SGEFET for controlling a connectivity between the circuit module and/or the IO and the analog bus. |
| US09520876B1 |
Power gating and clock gating in wiring levels
A semiconductor comprising a front end of line portion including a logical processing unit (LPU) and a second LPU. The first LPU configured to perform a first operation and the second LPU configured to perform a second operation following the first operation. A back end of line portion including a plurality of wiring levels, and further including a power gate and a clock gate that are integrated into one or more wiring levels of the plurality of wiring levels. The power gate and clock gate are further electrically connected to the first LPU by an enable wire. The power gate and clock gate are electrically connected to a power grid and a clock net, respectively, by the enable wire, and the enable wire is further electrically connected to a latch of the second LPU. A signal wire is electrically connected to the first LPU and to the latch. |
| US09520874B2 |
Operating a static transfer switch to eliminate transformer inrush current in the presence of residual flux
A method is provided for operating a static transfer switch to eliminate transformer inrush current in the presence of residual flux. The method includes: detecting an interrupt of electric power at an output terminal of the static transfer switch; controlling amplitude of voltage at the output terminal using phase fired control of one or more silicon controlled rectifiers interposed between a voltage source and the output terminal, where the amplitude of voltage is set at a value less than a peak value of the sinusoidal waveform; and increasing the amplitude of voltage at the output terminal incrementally until the amplitude reaches a peak value. |
| US09520873B2 |
Semiconductor device and electronic device
A semiconductor device having excellent data retention characteristics. A transistor with a low off-state current is utilized to save and retain data stored in a memory circuit, and a potential to be applied to a back gate of the transistor is applied from a battery provided for each memory circuit. The potential applied to the back gate of the transistor and a potential for charging the battery are generated in a voltage generation circuit. The battery is charged utilizing power gating of the memory circuit and data retention characteristics is improved. |
| US09520872B2 |
Linear equalizer with variable gain
A linear equalizer is configured with load transistors that load a corresponding differential pair of transistors. The linear equalizer is configured to selectively diode connect each load transistor to boost a high frequency gain. |
| US09520870B2 |
Systems and methods for pulse width modulated control of a semiconductor switch
Pulse width modulated controller systems. Implementations may include: a microcontroller coupled with a memory, a switch controller coupled with the microcontroller, and a calibration unit. The calibration unit may include one or more comparators, one or more passive electrical components, and an encoder logic all operatively coupled together and coupled with the microcontroller and with the switch controller where the at least one comparator and the one or more passive electrical components are electrically coupled with a supply voltage to the semiconductor switch and with a load voltage (output voltage) from the semiconductor switch. |
| US09520865B2 |
Delay circuits and related systems and methods
Delay circuits, and related systems and methods are disclosed. In one aspect, a delay circuit is provided that uses logic to delay accurately an output enable signal to reduce or avoid data hazards within a slave device. The delay circuit includes two shift register chains configured to receive an output enable in signal based on a slow clock. A first shift register chain is clocked by a positive edge of a fast clock, and provides a first strobe signal. A second shift register chain is clocked by a negative edge of the fast clock, and provides a second strobe signal. The logic uses the first and second strobe signals, and the output enable in signal, to provide a delayed output enable out signal. The delay circuit provides a highly accurate time delay for the output enable signal to reduce or avoid data hazards in an area and power efficient manner. |
| US09520864B2 |
Delay structure for a memory interface
Systems and methods for delaying a signal are described herein. In one embodiment, a method for delaying a signal comprises receiving a first signal edge, and, in response to receiving the first signal edge, counting a number of oscillations of an oscillator. The method also comprises outputting a second signal edge if the number of oscillations reaches a predetermined number. The second signal edge represents a delayed version of the first signal edge. |
| US09520861B1 |
System and method for harmonic suppression
A system to generate an oscillator signal. The system includes a multi-stage oscillator, where each stage generates an output. The system also includes a first weighting circuit coupled to the multi-stage oscillator. The first weighting circuit taps the outputs of at least some of the stages and applies a first variable weighting factor to each output of the tapped stages to generate a first weighted output for each of the tapped stages. The system also includes a first summing circuit coupled to the first weighting circuit. The first summing circuit sums the first weighted outputs of the tapped stages to produce the oscillator signal. |
| US09520856B2 |
Acoustic resonator structure having an electrode with a cantilevered portion
An acoustic resonator comprises a first electrode and second electrode comprising a plurality of sides. At least one of the sides of the second electrode comprises a cantilevered portion. A piezoelectric layer is disposed between the first and second electrodes. A bridge disposed adjacent to one of the sides of the second electrode. |
| US09520854B2 |
Tunable capacitor integrated on one semiconductor die or on one module
Disclosed is a tunable capacitor. The tunable capacitor according to a first embodiment of the present invention includes: a first capacitor; and a switching transistor which switches on/off the connection of the first capacitor between the first terminal and the second terminal, wherein an on/off operation of the switching transistor is performed by a high signal H and a low signal L. The tunable capacitor according to a second embodiment of the present invention includes: a first capacitor; and a switching transistor which switches on/off the connection of the first capacitor between the first terminal and the second terminal, wherein an on/off operation of the switching transistor is performed by a high signal H and a low signal L, and wherein the tunable capacitor is integrated on one semiconductor die or on one module. |
| US09520853B2 |
Radio frequency (RF) series attenuator module for bridging two RF transmission lines on adjacent circuit substrates
An attenuator module having an attenuator disposed on a top surface of a substrate, an input terminal at one end of the attenuator and an output terminal at an opposite end of the attenuator. A pair of spaced electrical conductor pads is disposed on a bottom surface of the substrate, a first one of the pads being disposed under the input terminal and a second one of the pads being disposed under the output terminal. A pair of conductive vias passes through the substrate, one conductive via connecting the input terminal to the first one of the pads and the other conductive via connecting the output terminal to the second one of the pads. The module may be used to interconnect two adjacent circuit substrates. |
| US09520851B2 |
Predictive automatic gain control in a media processing system
A method and a media processing system (MPS) for automatic gain control are provided. The MPS detects a portion of an input signal corresponding to a measurement window associated with a predetermined time interval and determines a peak value of the input signal during a first predetermined time segment within the measurement window. The MPS determines a number of occurrences of the peak value during a second predetermined time segment within the measurement window and compares the determined number of occurrences of the peak value with a predefined range of occurrences for identifying a speech portion or a non-speech portion of the input signal corresponding to the measurement window. The MPS adjusts a gain corresponding to the first predetermined time segment based on the peak value, upon identifying the speech portion. The MPS iteratively performs the method by shifting the measurement window in steps of the first predetermined time segment. |
| US09520849B2 |
Rail-to-rail constant transconductance differential input stage
A primary differential input pair of transistors and a secondary differential input pair of transistors are capable of operating in parallel to provide load current. A level-shifting pre-stage to the secondary differential pair downwardly level-shifts rail-to-rail input signals. Doing so prevents the secondary differential pair from entering cut-off. A tail current shunt device provides tail current to the secondary differential pair as the primary differential pair approaches cut-off when a common-mode component of the input signals approaches the positive voltage rail. Consequently, the sum of currents through first differential input transistors associated with the primary and secondary differential input pairs remains constant to the first load. Likewise, the sum of currents through the second differential input transistors associated with the primary and secondary differential input pairs remains constant to the second load. Both arms of the composite differential input stage present constant transconductances to their respective loads as a result. |
| US09520848B2 |
Amplifier, liquid crystal displaying driving circuit and liquid crystal display apparatus
Disclosed herein is an amplifier including a voltage follower circuit having differential input terminals and an output terminal fed back to a first one of the differential input terminals, the voltage follower circuit being configured to amplify an input signal inputted to a second one of the differential input terminals and output the amplified signal from the output terminal; a first current source configured to supply a predetermined current to the voltage follower circuit; and a second current source configured to supply current to the voltage follower circuit when a potential difference between the second one of the differential input terminals and the output terminal is equal to or higher than a predetermined value. |
| US09520846B2 |
Current-driven baseband filter with reduced adjacent channel leakage ratio (ACLR)
Certain aspects of the present disclosure provide methods and apparatus for processing an input signal. One example apparatus is a circuit that generally includes an amplifier, comprising a first transistor and a second transistor connected in cascode with the first transistor; a buffer coupled to an output of the amplifier and configured to provide feedback to the amplifier; and a current source coupled to the second transistor and incorporated into a loop of the feedback to the amplifier. |
| US09520843B2 |
Power amplifiers coupled in series
A power amplifier system is disclosed, the power amplifier system comprising two power supplies, four amplifier half-bridges arranged as two amplifier full bridges, and an audio processor for establishing control signals for the amplifier full-bridges, where the audio processor and one of the power supplies share a common ground potential, whereas the other power supply has a floating ground; wherein both the amplifier with common ground and the amplifier with floating ground have an amplifier interconnection output and an amplifier output, and wherein the amplifier interconnection outputs are connected, and a load is connected to the amplifier outputs. Further are disclosed amplification methods and PA systems correspondingly. |
| US09520838B2 |
Inverter type power amplifier
The present disclosure relates to an inverter type power amplifier. An exemplary embodiment of the present disclosure provides an inverter type power amplifier including: a first transistor including a gate to which an AC type of input signal is applied through an input port, a first terminal connected a power source voltage, and a second terminal connected to an output port; a second transistor including a gate through which the input signal is applied thereto, a first terminal connected to a ground, and a second terminal connected to the output port; a feedback resistor including a first terminal connected to the input port and a second terminal connected to the output port; and an AC blocking block including a first terminal connected to the output port and a second terminal connected to a DC output port. |
| US09520837B1 |
Pulse shaping biasing circuitry
Pulse shaping biasing circuitry includes square wave generator circuitry and inverse ramp signal generator circuitry. The square wave generator circuitry is coupled between an input node and signal summation circuitry, and is configured to generate a square wave signal. The inverse ramp signal generator circuitry is coupled in parallel with the square wave generator circuitry and configured to generate an inverted ramp signal based on a supply voltage and a temperature. By generating the inverted ramp signal based on the supply voltage and temperature, the pulse shaping biasing circuitry may compensate an RF power amplifier operated in a pulsed mode such that an error vector magnitude thereof is minimized even as the supply voltage provided to the RF power amplifier and the temperature change. |
| US09520836B1 |
Multi-stage amplifier with cascode stage and DC bias regulator
A multi-stage amplifier having a first amplifier stage comprising: a pair of transistors arranged in a cascade amplifier arrangement; and an isolation circuit; and a second amplifier stage coupled to an output of the first amplifier stage; and bias regulator having a reference transistor. The cascode amplifier stage includes a pair of transistors arranged in a cascode amplifier arrangement. The bias regulator produces a reference current through the reference transistor and DC bias voltages for the control electrodes of each of the pair of transistors in the cascode amplifier arrangement and for the second stage's transistor as a function of the reference current through the reference transistor. |
| US09520833B1 |
Active ring mixer
An active ring mixer circuit for use in a receive or transmit channel of an RF radio. The circuit comprises plural transistor pairs arranged in a ring and biased into an active or saturation region. A first input is adapted to receive an RF signal. The first input is electrically combined with the plural transistor pairs to provide negative feedback to the plural transistor pairs. A second input electrically combined with the plural transistor pairs is adapted to receive a local oscillator signal. An output of the mixer is adapted to provide a mixed signal from the plural transistor pairs. Advantageously, the mixer circuit induces little low frequency spurs that may interfere with radio operation and has significantly reduced power consumption, lower noise figure, and good balance. |
| US09520831B1 |
Method and apparatus for synthesizing signals with phase continuous and phase coherent transitions
A direct digital synthesizer (DDS) includes a phase increment calculator that determines a phase increment for a selected frequency; a phase accumulator that accumulates the phase increment over time and provides an accumulated phase value; a converter that converts the accumulated phase value to an analog signal at the selected frequency; and a phase preset calculator that determines a phase preset value for the selected frequency. The phase accumulator resets the accumulated phase value to the phase preset value at a transition to the selected frequency in a phase coherent mode. |
| US09520830B2 |
Crystal oscillator
A crystal oscillator has characteristics in that reduction in oscillation margin makes the crystal oscillator less likely to oscillate, with the result that an amplitude of a voltage waveform at an input terminal of a CMOS inverter is reduced. A crystal oscillator of the invention has a detection circuit that outputs an alarm signal when the amplitude of the voltage waveform at the input terminal of the CMOS inverter becomes equal to or less than a predetermined specified value. As a result, it is possible to detect a change in the oscillation margin of the crystal oscillator without switching between circuits even after the crystal oscillator is incorporated in a device. |
| US09520829B1 |
Apparatus and method of fine capacitance tuning for high resolution digitally controlled oscillator
An apparatus and a method are provided. The apparatus includes a first capacitor, including a first end and a second end; a second capacitor, including a first end connected to the second end of the first capacitor, and a second end; a variable capacitor, including a first end connected to the second end of the first capacitor, and a second end; a third capacitor, including a first end connected to the first end of the first capacitor, and a second end connected to the second end of the variable capacitor; and a fourth capacitor, including a first end connected to the second end of the third capacitor, and a second end connected to the second end of the second capacitor. |
| US09520825B2 |
Portable solar panel tracking device
A portable self-contained solar energy generation platform for tracking a source of solar energy and automatically maintaining optimum solar collection panel positioning for maximum energy output during operation. The solar tracking platform comprises a folding solar panel support stand on a power turntable with a solar tracker control actuation device in communication therewith. |
| US09520821B1 |
System and method for optimizing flux regulation in electric motors
A system and method for dynamically optimizing flux levels in electric motors based on estimated torque. Motor parameters and motor equations are used to estimate operating characteristics and to set current and voltage limits which define an optimal flux operating range for a given speed and torque of the motor. A slope of a linear flux gain is determined within the defined operating range at different speeds of the motor. The determined slopes for the different speeds are saved in a memory element. A control element determines and achieves an optimal flux level for the motor by accessing the table to identify a specific slope which corresponds to an actual speed of the motor, multiplying the slope by the estimated torque and adding an offset value to determine a phase current component value associated with the optimal flux level, and applying the determined phase current component value to the motor. |
| US09520816B2 |
Electric motor signature reduction system
A method and apparatus for controlling a group of electric motors. A controller is configured to identify a group of switching frequencies for a desired signature for the group of electric motors. The controller is further configured to control switching of a current supplied to the group of electric motors with the group of switching frequencies for the desired signature identified. |
| US09520807B2 |
Power converter that delays state changes of on/off pulses and control method thereof
Aspects of the invention can provide a control method of a power converter that is capable of preventing increase of electromagnetic noise that are caused by simultaneous change of the states of power semiconductor switching elements of the power converter. State changes of ON/OFF pulses that are input to power semiconductor switching elements are detected, and, when the timings of the state changes of any two of the ON/OFF pulses match each other, the state change of either one of the ON/OFF pulses, of which state changes match each other, is delayed. |
| US09520804B2 |
Power converter and matrix converter
The number of ICs used for a power converter is reduced. The power converter includes n power transistors each having an emitter terminal or a source terminal connected to a common line, and driver ICs. Each of the driver ICs includes n pre-drivers that drive the respective n power transistors, and a receiver circuit that is integrated monolithically with the n pre-drivers. The receiver circuit is coupled with a transmitter circuit by AC coupling, and outputs a control signal that controls the n pre-drivers in response to a signal received from the transmitter circuit. |
| US09520802B2 |
Power semiconductor module, power converting apparatus and railway car
A power semiconductor module applied to a power converting apparatus for a railway car includes an element pair formed by connecting an IGBT and an SiC-FWD in anti-parallel to each other and an element pair formed by connecting an Si-IGBT and an SiC-FWD in anti-parallel to each other. The element pair and the element pair are housed in one module and configured as a 2-in-1 module in a manner that the first element pair operates as a positive side arm of the power converting apparatus and the second element pair operates as a negative side arm of the power converting apparatus. The element pairs are formed such that a ratio of an occupied area of SiC-FWD chips to an occupied area of IGBT chips in the element pairs is equal to or higher than 15% and lower than 45%. |
| US09520801B1 |
Method and system for a gas tube switch-based voltage source high voltage direct current transmission system
A voltage source converter based high-voltage direct-current (HVDC) transmission system includes a voltage source converter (VSC)-based power converter channel. The VSC-based power converter channel includes an AC-DC converter and a DC-AC inverter electrically coupled to the AC-DC converter. The AC-DC converter and a DC-AC inverter include at least one gas tube switching device coupled in electrical anti-parallel with a respective gas tube diode. The VSC-based power converter channel includes a commutating circuit communicatively coupled to one or more of the at least one gas tube switching devices. The commutating circuit is configured to “switch on” a respective one of the one or more gas tube switching devices during a first portion of an operational cycle and “switch off” the respective one of the one or more gas tube switching devices during a second portion of the operational cycle. |
| US09520799B2 |
Power device
An energy efficient apparatus includes a switching device, a frequency dependent reactive device, and a control element is provided. The switching device is coupled to a source of electrical power and includes a pair of transistors and is adapted to receive a control signal and to produce an alternating current power signal. The frequency of the alternating current power signal is responsive to the control signal. The frequency dependent reactive device is electrically coupled to the pair of transistors for receiving the alternating current power signal and producing an output power signal. The frequency dependent reactive device is chosen to achieve a desired voltage of the output power signal relative to the frequency of the alternating current power signal. The control element senses an actual voltage of the direct current power signal and modifies the control signal delivered to achieve the desired voltage of the direct current power signal. |
| US09520798B2 |
Multi-level DC-DC converter with galvanic isolation and adaptive conversion ratio
A multi-level DC-DC converter includes an input side to receive a DC power having an input voltage and current, an output side to provide power to a load at a desired output voltage and current, and a plurality of tranformer-isolated DC-DC converters connected between the input and output sides, with the tranformer-isolated DC-DC converters being connected in series on one side and connected in parallel on another side. Each of the tranformer isolated DC-DC converters further includes a power transformer having a primary winding and a secondary winding, and a plurality of switching devices each selectively operable in one of an On state and an Off state. Operating the switching devices in a complementary On state and Off state alternately at a controlled switching frequency provides for engaging the tranformer isolated DC-DC converter and operating the switching devices in a simultaneously On state bypasses the transformer isolated DC-DC converter. |
| US09520793B2 |
Stacked power converter assembly
A stacked magnetic power converter assembly includes a plurality of converter modules disposed in a stacked arrangement with respect to one another to define a thickness of stacked magnetic power converter assembly. Each converter module includes a primary switching unit, a secondary switching unit, and a converter unit. The converter unit includes a primary terminal in signal communication with the primary switching unit and a secondary terminal in signal communication with the secondary switching unit. Each primary switching unit, each secondary switching unit, and each converter unit is shared among the plurality of converter modules. |
| US09520789B2 |
Power supply device
A power supply device includes an output semiconductor element and a clamp circuit. The output semiconductor element is provided between a power supply line and an output terminal. The output semiconductor element is driven and switched so as to supply electric power to an inductive load connected to the output terminal. The clamp circuit clamps a voltage applied between the power supply line and the output terminal due to a counter electromotive force generated in the inductive load when the output semiconductor element turns OFF, with reference to an operation reference voltage of the output semiconductor element. Thus, it is possible to provide a power supply device including a clamp circuit which can effectively clamp a negative voltage surge derived from a counter electromotive force generated in an inductive load, at a low clamp voltage. |
| US09520787B2 |
Voltage regulator device having negative current sensing and control method thereof
A voltage regulator device includes at least one output unit, a current sensing unit, a control unit, at least one transistor driving unit and a pulse width modulation unit. The output unit outputs an output signal. The output unit includes a first transistor, a second transistor and an energy storage element. The second transistor is electronically connected to the first transistor and the energy storage element, respectively. The current sensing unit is electronically connected to a first end and a second end of the energy storage element. The control unit is electronically connected to the current sensing unit and the output unit, respectively. The transistor driving unit is disposed corresponding to the output unit and is electronically connected to the control unit and the output unit. The pulse width modulation unit is electronically connected to the control unit and the transistor driving unit, respectively. |
| US09520786B2 |
Regulating device for a multi-phase voltage converter
A regulating device for a multi-phase voltage converter includes a connecting element for picking-off an input/output voltage signal at a power path of the multi-phase voltage converter, and a filter, which is configured and coupled to the connecting element so as to cause the filter to output a filter output signal, which correlates to the ripple of the input/output voltage signal. A correcting unit is configured and connected to the filter and to the multi-phase voltage converter such that, owing to the correcting unit, an actuating signal is output to the multi-phase voltage converter, which actuating signal generates a change in the ripple of the input/output voltage signal. |
| US09520783B2 |
Illumination device control systems and methods
In various embodiments, a control system for an electronic circuit iteratively applies voltage to and senses current from a load to regulate operation of the load. |
| US09520780B2 |
Switching mode power supply with spread spectrum oscillator
Apparatus for use in a system, including a microcontroller for controlling the system, where the microcontroller includes at least one internal module capable of generating a periodic pulse signal. The microcontroller is programmed and operated so that the internal module generates a periodic pulse signal that is a pseudo-random spread spectrum oscillator signal. A switching mode power supply is responsive to the pseudo-random spread spectrum oscillator signal. The switching mode power supply comprises a solid state switch and a modulator for driving the solid state switch with a drive signal related to the periodic pulse signal generated by the internal module of the microcontroller. |
| US09520779B2 |
Three-D power converter in three distinct strata
A switching power supply in an integrated circuit, an integrated circuit comprising a switching power supply, and a method of assembling a switching power supply in an integrated circuit are disclosed. In one embodiment, the invention provides a three-dimensional switching power supply in an integrated circuit comprising a device layer. The switching power supply comprises three distinct strata arranged in series with the device layer, the three distinct strata including a switching layer including switching circuits, a capacitor layer including banks of capacitors, and an inductor layer including inductors. This switching power supply further comprises a multitude of connectors electrically and mechanically connecting together the device layer, the switching layer, the capacitor layer, and the inductor layer. The switching circuits, the capacitors and the inductors form a switching power supply for supplying power to the device layer. |
| US09520771B2 |
Power supply and apparatus and method for controlling link voltage control switch
A power supply includes a rectifier for rectifying an AC line voltage to generate a link voltage, a link capacitor for charging the link voltage, a control switch for controlling charge of the link capacitor, a converter for converting the link voltage to a DC voltage, and a switch controller. When the converter operates in a standby operation mode, the switch controller controls on-off of the control switch through a pulse signal having an on-time determined based on a peak value of a detected AC line voltage. |
| US09520767B2 |
Protection circuit for power converter
A protection circuit of a power converter without an input capacitor is disclosed. The protection circuit comprises a high voltage switch, a detection circuit and a control circuit. The switch senses an input voltage of the power converter via a resistor for generating a first signal. The detection circuit coupled to a transformer senses the input voltage of the power converter for generating a second signal. The control circuit controls a switching signal in response to the first signal and the second signal. The switching signal is utilized to switching the transformer for regulating the power converter; and the level of the first signal and the second signal is correlated a level of the input voltage of the power converter. |
| US09520762B2 |
Method and fixture for twisting end portions of bar conductors, in particular for bar windings of electric machines
A twisting method is described, for twisting free end portions of bar conductors for the stator or rotor bar winding of an electrical machine. The twisting method allows achieving a non uniform twisting of the bar conductors from the welding side of the stator or rotor core by means of a twisting fixture. The twisting fixture comprises a pocket member including a main structure provided with an arc of adjacent pockets and a secondary structure, provided with at least one further pocket, which can axially translate with respect to the main structure. |
| US09520761B2 |
Production method for laminated iron core
A production method for the laminated iron core includes a first process that segment iron core pieces which respectively have circular arc angles obtained by dividing 360° as an angle of circumference into m are separated from a belt shaped iron core material and mounted on a mount base, the segment iron core pieces are carried to a laminating position of a rotary laminating mechanism by a pusher and the rotary laminating mechanism including the carried segment iron core piece therein is rotated by 360°/m and a second process that the first process is repeated to form an annularly connected iron core piece in which the segment iron core pieces are annularly arranged. The second process is repeated to form a caulked and laminated iron core having a prescribed thickness. During the second process, the segment iron core pieces are caulked and laminated in the rotary laminating mechanism. |
| US09520757B2 |
Dual-shaft gas turbine power generation system, and control device and control method for gas turbine system
The dual-shaft gas turbine power generation system includes: a high-pressure gas turbine; a first rotating shaft connecting a compressor and the high-pressure gas turbine; an electric motor connected to the first rotating shaft; a governor which adjusts the amount of air taken into the compressor; a low-pressure gas turbine; a second rotating shaft connected to the low-pressure gas turbine; a synchronous power generator connected to the second rotating shaft; a frequency converter which converts the frequency of power transmitted between the synchronous power generator and the electric motor; and a control device which controls a frequency converter control device for controlling the frequency converter, and the governor, on the basis of a power output command value indicating the power to be outputted to an external grid. |
| US09520755B2 |
Apparatus and method for induction motor heat transfer
A heat sink apparatus for induction motors and other dynamoelectric machines. The heat sink has a mounting portion adapted for coupling to a motor housing. A first heat sink portion is adapted for insertion into a motor housing interior, such as through an aperture in the frame or bearing bracket, and is thermally coupled to a second heat sink portion that is adapted for orientation outside the housing. The heat sink apparatus first heat sink portion may be inserted within an air channel of a TEFC induction motor. The heat sink preferably has a higher heat transfer rate than the motor housing. |
| US09520754B2 |
Motor and disk drive apparatus
A motor for use in a disk drive apparatus includes a bearing, a rotary unit, a stator, a thin flat base member, and a cylindrical holder extending in an axial direction. The base member includes a first through-hole, a peripheral edge portion, and a thin portion. The thin portion is located radially outward of the peripheral edge portion. The thin portion has an axial thickness smaller than an axial thickness of the peripheral edge portion. The holder includes a first protrusion portion and a second protrusion portion. The first protrusion portion extends radially outward and is located axially above the peripheral edge portion. The second protrusion portion extends radially outward and is located axially below the peripheral edge portion. The bearing is located inside the holder. A stator core is located radially outside the holder and axially above the thin portion. |
| US09520753B2 |
Stator assembly with winding sets having hairpins from multiple hairpin layers
A stator assembly includes a plurality of stator slots defining multiple slot layers. The assembly includes a plurality of hairpins each having a respective first leg positioned in one of the multiple slot layers and a respective second leg positioned in another of the multiple slot layers. Each hairpin is configured to allow a current to flow from the respective first leg to the respective second leg. The plurality of hairpins is divided into multiple hairpin layers. The hairpins form multiple winding sets, such as first, second, third and fourth winding sets. Each of the winding sets at least partially includes the hairpins from at least two of the multiple hairpin layers. The multiple slot layers may include six slot layers. The multiple hairpin layers may include six hairpin layers. Thus, at least one of the hairpin layers may be “shared” by two winding sets. |
| US09520749B2 |
Wireless power transmission method and system for preventing frequency interference
A wireless power transmission method and system for prevention frequency interference is provided to prevent frequency interference and collision between a wireless power transmitter and other devices which use a frequency adjacent to frequency band of the power signal transmitting from the wireless power transmitter. The wireless power transmission method includes outputting a using signal upon use of a wireless device and operating the wireless power transmitter based on whether the using signal is transmitted. |
| US09520744B2 |
Reducing power losses in a redundant power supply system
A power supply system includes at least a first power supply module and at least one redundant power supply module. The at least one power supply module supplies power to an output terminal. The at least one redundant power supply module operates in a first state and in a second state. In the first state the second power supply module supplies power to the output terminal. In the second state the second power supply module provides standby power and operates in a burst mode (for example, such as a discontinuous conduction mode). |
| US09520733B2 |
Charging and discharging device to increase battery temperature by controlling ripple current
A charging and discharging device includes a switching circuit, an input of which is connected to a power supply, the switching circuit adjusting an output current IB to a power storing unit connected to an output of the switching circuit, and a control unit configured to generate an ON/OFF signal DGC to the switching circuit. The control unit includes a temperature-rise control unit configured to separately generate, based on a signal BTMP equivalent to the temperature of the power storing unit, a control signal FC for adjusting a ripple component of the output current IB and a control signal OFS for adjusting a non-ripple component of the output current IB and generates the ON/OFF signal DGC based on the control signal FC and the control signal OFS and outputs the ON/OFF signal DGC to the switching circuit. |
| US09520732B1 |
Regulate current battery usage of a mobile device
Various embodiments of the invention provide methods, systems, and computer-program products for charging a battery of a first mobile device from a battery of a second mobile device. In particular embodiments, a request is received identifying an amount of charge to provide from the battery of the second device to the battery of the first device. Accordingly, a determination is made as to whether the amount of charge requested is likely to result in a battery charge of the second device dropping below a threshold value before the battery of the device is recharged based on historical battery charge usage data of the device over a past period of time. If the amount of charge is not likely to result in the battery charge dropping below the threshold value, then the battery of the first device is charged with the amount of charge from the battery of the second device. |
| US09520731B2 |
Control method for cleaning robots
An embodiment of the invention provides a charging station for a cleaning robot. The charging station includes an IR transmitter and a controller. The IR transmitter outputs a first IR light beam, wherein the IR light beam includes a second boundary and a first boundary which is substantially perpendicular or perpendicular to the charging station and the cleaning robot moves to the charging station along the first boundary. The controller controls the IR transmitter to output the first IR light beam or a second IR light beam. When the controller determines that the cleaning robot is near to the charging station, the controller controls the IR transmitter to output the second IR light beam. |
| US09520725B2 |
Wireless power transfer system, transmission device, and controlling method of wireless power transfer system
A wireless power transfer system includes a power receiving device that receives transmission by wireless power transfer, a transmission device that has a transmission element that transmits transmission power to the power receiving device, the transmission device having a control mechanism that controls an oriented direction of the transmission element, and a positioning device that is connected communicably with the transmission device, the positioning device receiving with a plurality of antennas arranged adjacent to each other a positioning signal that is a wireless signal transmitted from the power receiving device, the positioning device having a positioning function that calculates a direction α in which the power receiving device exists when seen from the positioning device itself and a position of the power receiving device, based on a phase difference between the received positioning signals. |
| US09520719B2 |
Reluctance motor
A reluctance motor having a rotor and a stator that has a wound core, around which a stator coil is wound and which is open on one side and has legs, said legs being arranged around the periphery and forming spaced-apart pairs of legs. Multiple rotor teeth which are distributed around the periphery and periodically establish a magnetic flux between the legs radially engage between the legs. In order to positively change the characteristic curve of the magnetic flux of the legs and teeth, the teeth continuously form an area overlap with the legs in the direction of rotation of the rotor in accordance with the angle of rotation. |
| US09520718B2 |
Uninterruptible power supply circuit
An uninterruptible power supply circuit is provided. The uninterruptible power supply circuit includes a bidirectional selector switch, a first-type bidirectional converter, a second-type bidirectional converter, an energy storage apparatus, and a filtering apparatus, and is alternatively connected to an alternating-current power supply and the energy storage apparatus by using the bidirectional selector switch; the first-type bidirectional converter is disposed between the bidirectional selector switch and the filtering apparatus, the second-type bidirectional converter is disposed between the filtering apparatus and a load, and both the first-type bidirectional converter and the second-type bidirectional converter have a function of rectifying or inverting. By using a bidirectional converter and a bidirectional selector switch, alternating-current commercial power, the energy storage apparatus, and a charger required by the energy storage apparatus can share the bidirectional converter; compared with an existing uninterruptible power supply circuit, no extra charger or high-power conversion circuit is required. |
| US09520716B2 |
Electrostatic protection circuit and semiconductor integrated circuit apparatus
The following are included: a series circuit that is connected between a first node and a second node and includes an impedance element and a capacitor connected to each other by a third node; a first transistor that is connected between the first node and a fourth node and turns on in accordance with an increase in voltage generated in the impedance element; a voltage divider circuit that divides voltage between the fourth node and the second node; a second transistor that turns on in accordance with an increase in the divided voltage and increases current flowing in the impedance element; a detection circuit that activates an output signal upon detection of an on state of the second transistor; and a discharge circuit that allows current to flow from the first node to the second node when the output signal of the detection circuit is activated. |
| US09520715B2 |
ESD protection device of touch panel
An ESD protection device for a touch panel is disclosed. The protection device includes an ESD protection circuit, and a protection switch connected in series with the ESD protection circuit. The protection switch is configured to turn on in response to an electrostatic potential of a sensing line or a driving line of the touch panel being equal to or greater than a preset potential, such that static electricity from the sensing line or the driving line is conducted to a peripheral common electrode busbar, or to an ESD discharge busbar, or to a ground busbar. In addition, the protection switch is configured to turn off in response to a panel of the touch panel being normally driven. |
| US09520712B2 |
Method and system for controlling the turn-on time of a device that includes a magnetic circuit
A method and a system for controlling the switching time of a device that includes a magnetic circuit and a conductive winding. The method includes acquiring a measurement of the magnetic field generated by the residual flux, by a sensor placed near the magnetic circuit; processing the acquired measurements to infer the residual flux in the magnetic circuit; determining, on the basis of the residual flux, the optimal time for switching on the device. The method also includes switching on a three-phase transformer. The transformer includes a primary conductive winding and a secondary conductive winding surrounded by an enclosure. A magnetic field sensor is on the magnetic circuit and/or on one outer surface of the enclosure. |
| US09520709B2 |
Surge protection device having two part ceramic case for metal oxide varistor with isolated thermal cut off
A surge protection device comprises a gas-tight container formed by a ceramic housing and ceramic lid surrounding an uncoated MOV device, to contain explosive gases and scattered solids produced during a thermal runaway. There is no coating on the MOV device, such as an organic polymer coating. Instead, the ceramic housing has two gas-tight chambers separated by a ceramic partition. The MOV device is located in a first gas-tight chamber and has an electrode that passes into the second gas-tight chamber and terminates in a fixed contact. A thermal cutoff device of simple construction, is located in the second gas-tight chamber, having a spring connector terminating in a moveable contact that is bonded to the electrode by a low melting point solder. The ceramic partition shields the thermal cutoff device from being fouled by debris scattered from destruction of the MOV device's metal oxide core during a thermal runaway. |
| US09520707B2 |
Device for protecting a user
A device for protecting a user includes a first current path including a first and second conduit, and a monitoring device for detecting an imminent overload of the electric user. In an embodiment, the monitoring device includes a first temperature measurement unit, a support, an evaluation unit and a first transducer to produce an electrically conductive connection between the first and second conduits of the first current path. The first temperature measurement unit is, electrically insulated from the first transducer and includes a first temperature sensor. An additional electrically insulating material; is arranged on a first lateral surface of the support between the first transducer and the support and the first temperature sensor is arranged on the support to detect a temperature of the first transducer. The evaluating unit is configured to detect an imminent overload at the user on the basis of temperatures detected by the first temperature sensor. |
| US09520704B2 |
Side-loading quadrant deadend clamp assembly
A clamp assembly includes a body member and a keeper. A cable groove is formed in the body member to receive a cable. The keeper has a lower surface to engage the cable received in the cable groove. A threaded fastener connects the keeper to the body member. A recess is formed in the body member to receive a washer on the fastener. |
| US09520703B2 |
Electrical busway splice connector
A busway splice connector can include a first connector and a second connector. Each of the first connector and the second connector can define a busbar volume for receiving a portion of two busbars. The busway splice connector can also include a first housing that defines a first compartment for receiving the first connector. The busway splice connector can also include a second housing that defines a second compartment for receiving the second connector. The busway splice connector can also include an insulator configured to be positioned between the first housing and the second housing and to insulate the first connector from the second connector when the busway splice connector is assembled. |
| US09520702B2 |
Clamp-integrated wiring harness protector for assembling and method for producing the same
An object of the present invention is to provide a clamp-integrated wiring harness protector for assembling, in which a man-hour for assembling the protector is unnecessary, and workability upon assembling with a wiring harness is satisfactory, and the wiring harness is protected after assembling, and the protector can be produced at low cost. The clamp-integrated wiring harness protector for assembling including: a sheet-shaped portion; and a clamp portion integrally formed with the sheet-shaped portion. |
| US09520698B2 |
Outdoor enclosure for power distribution equipment
An outdoor enclosure for housing power distribution equipment is disclosed herein. The outdoor enclosure includes improved means for evacuating arc flash gases from inside the enclosure to the atmosphere, comprising an expansion chamber and improved chimney. The chimney includes a chimney base and chimney capping structure arrangement designed to allow for the safe ventilation of arc fault gases to the atmosphere, while maintaining weather-proof characteristics. |
| US09520694B2 |
Optical amplifier with loss adjustment unit based on gain
An optical amplifier includes an optical amplifying unit, a splitting unit, and a loss adjusting unit. The optical amplifying unit provides gain to wavelength multiplexed light received from a transmission line, to amplify light intensity. The splitting unit splits the amplified wavelength multiplexed light. The loss adjusting unit adjusts loss provided to each wavelength of a first portion of the split wavelength multiplexed light based on the gain. |
| US09520689B2 |
Housing for a high speed electrical connector
An electrical connector designed for high speed signals. The connector includes one or more features that, when used alone or in combination, extend performance to higher speeds. These features may include compensation for tie bars that are used to hold conductive members in place for molding a housing around the conductive members. Removal of the tie bars during manufacture of the connector may leave artifacts in the conductive members and/or housing, which may be addressed by the features. The conductive members, for example, may include regions, adjacent tie bar locations, that compensate for portions of the tie bar that are not fully removed. Alternatively or additionally, a housing may include openings around tie bar locations such that a punch may be used to sever the tie bars. These openings may be filled to avoid performance-affecting artifacts. |
| US09520686B2 |
Electrical connector having detecting contact
An electrical connector includes an insulating housing, a plurality of conductive terminals, a detecting contact and a metallic shell. The insulating housing has a base portion extending along a longitudinal direction and a mating tongue extending forwardly from the base portion. The mating tongue has a receiving slot recessed therefrom in which the detecting contact received. The metallic shell surrounds the insulating housing to form a receiving room. The detecting contact defines a detecting section extending out of the receiving slot for protruding into the receiving room. The insulating housing defines a supporting block formed in the receiving slot for supporting the detecting contact to prevent the detecting contact from over-skewing. |
| US09520685B2 |
Electrical connector having sidewardly exposed contacts
An electrical connector includes: an insulating body having an upper face and a lower face, two opposite side faces, a front face and a rear face, and a plug-receiving hole; and a number of terminals mounted to the insulating body, each terminal having a holding portion, an elastic portion extending into the hole, and an abutment portion. The abutment portion is movably exposed to a corresponding side face. |
| US09520683B2 |
Connector and manufacturing method thereof
An electrical connector and a manufacturing method thereof includes a housing made of plastic material and at least one terminal module fixed in the housing. The housing defines a mating portion extending along a front-to-rear direction and the mating portion defines at least one mating surface in a vertical direction. The terminal module includes a plurality of conductive terminals with contacting portions and an insulating block, the housing is injection molded with the terminal module to form the mating portion so that the contacting portions of the conductive terminals are exposed on the mating surface. It is simple to manufacture and conducive to reduce the manufacturing cost. |
| US09520681B2 |
Plug connector, receptacle connector, and electric connector assembly thereof
Disclosed are a plug connector component, a receptacle connector component, and a connector assembly. The plug connector comprises: an inserting portion; a printed circuit board, one portion of which is coupled to the inserting portion; an upper housing; and a lower housing, on which the upper housing is jointed, a receiving space for receiving the printed circuit board being formed between the upper housing and the lower housing, a side wall of the lower housing being partially outwardly bent to form a receiving groove on the side wall of the lower housing, a side of the printed circuit board being received in the receiving groove, the inserting portion being secured at a front end of the upper housing and the lower housing. The receptacle connector comprises a second metal shell having a joint chamber and a first module and a second module that are secured in the second metal shell, wherein: a first terminal is inlaid and insert molding in the first module; a second terminal is inlaid and insert molding in the second module, a contact portion of the first terminal overlapping a contact portion of the second terminal in a height direction perpendicular to an insertion direction; and a shielding plate is further inlaid and insert molding in the second module. |
| US09520679B2 |
Earthing arrangement for electrical panel
A rigid electrical panel has both a flexible printed circuit and an electrically conductive grounding layer embedded therein. The electrically conductive grounding layer is electrically connected to a grounding insert which is also embedded in the rigid material. The grounding insert has a base portion and an exposed portion. The electrically conductive grounding layer is connected to the base portion, and the exposed portion allows the grounding insert, and thus the electrically conductive grounding layer, to be electrically connected to a grounding point, for example on a gas turbine engine. |
| US09520678B2 |
Signal transmission connector
A signal transmission connector includes an insulating body, a plurality of first terminals, a plurality of second terminals, and a rear casing. The insulating body has a dielectric constant of about 3 to 3.4. The first and second terminals are disposed on the insulating body. The first and second terminals have widths of about 0.36 to 0.42 mm. The rear casing is assembled at the second end of the insulating body. The rear casing envelops the first and the second terminals. The rear casing has a dielectric constant of about 3.5 to 3.8. The connector provides adjustable impedance without modifications to the terminal structures and also reduces cost. |
| US09520674B2 |
Connector assembly with dual secondary lock
The present invention relates to a connector assembly for airbag restraint systems. The connector assembly comprises a connector housing and secondary locking means assigned to the connector housing. The secondary locking means is arranged movable relative to the connector housing and can be moved from an open position to a locked position. Further the secondary locking means comprises two separate locking members wherein each of the two separate locking members is configured to be independently movable. |
| US09520670B2 |
Tamper resistant receptacle
A tamper resistant receptacle having hot and neutral shutters and hot and neutral doors disposed in a housing. Simultaneous insertion of hot and neutral blades of an electrical plug allow the shutters to be actuated and the doors moved a distance sufficient to allow the plug blades to access the electrical contacts of the device. If only one plug blade opening in accessed, the blocking face of the shutter prevents further movement of the blade and denies access to the electrical contact disposed beneath the shutter. |
| US09520654B2 |
Source for parabolic antenna
The invention relates to a source (S) for a parabolic antenna, comprising: •—a sigma radiating assembly (1S, 1C, 1L) suitable for generating the sigma channel including a sigma radiating element (11) positioned on a main transmission/reception axis (A) of the source (S), and a sigma supply circuit (12) to supply the sigma radiating element (11), and •—a delta radiating assembly (2S, 2C, 2L) suitable for generating the delta channel including eight delta radiating elements (21S, 21C, 21L), arranged around the main transmission/reception axis (S) of the source (S), and a delta supply circuit (22S, 22C, 22L). |
| US09520653B2 |
Waveguide slot antenna
A waveguide slot antenna utilizing a waveguide as a feeding line and having a linear slot provided in a wall of the waveguide, the waveguide slot antenna comprising a flat-shaped conductor plate which has a first through-hole formed in a shape approximately identical to that of the slot and provided at a position opposed to the slot, and a second through-hole provided at a position intersecting the first through-hole. |
| US09520650B2 |
Combination LTE and WiGig antenna
A combined antenna device includes a coupled feed antenna including a first grounded coupling element and a millimeter wave phased array antenna having a ground plane structure including a portion of the first grounded coupling element. |
| US09520647B2 |
Vehicle mounted antenna device
A vehicle mounted antenna device installed on a vehicle includes a circuit board, a main element portion, and an auxiliary element portion. The main element portion, which has a substantially planar shape, is disposed on substantially the same plane as the circuit board, functions also as a capacitive antenna designed for a first frequency band, and includes a bent pattern having an antenna capacity substantially equivalent to a solid pattern. The auxiliary element portion includes a distributed constant element portion that is connected in series between the main element portion and an amplifier circuit so as to complement shortage of an antenna length of the main element portion so that the antenna length of the main element portion is designed for a second frequency band. The distributed constant element portion is mounted on the circuit board and has an antenna capacity smaller than that of the main element portion. |
| US09520646B1 |
Dual-band compact printed circuit antenna for WLAN use
A printed circuit antenna has a feedline region and a radiating structure region. The feedline region is formed of conductors on an upper plane, the conductors including a feedline which is edge coupled to a left ground structure and a right ground structure, all of which are above a ground plane. High-band RF is coupled from the RF feedline to a HB-U radiating structure including a first segment and a second segment perpendicular to the first segment, and also an HB-L radiating structure including a first segment coupled to a third segment through an air gap. Low-band RF is coupled across a gap from the first segment to a LB radiating structure having a third segment, a fourth segment, a fifth segment, a sixth segment, a seventh segment, an eighth segment, and a ninth segment with a terminus coupled to the left ground structure. |
| US09520645B2 |
Electronic device with electromagnetic shielding structures
A wireless electronic device may be provided with components such as electrical and structural components. During transmission of radio-frequency signals, antennas and wireless communications circuitry of the wireless electronic device may produce associated time-varying magnetic fields. One or more components may be covered with magnetic-resistant shield structures that protect the components from the time-varying magnetic fields by preventing magnetic-induced vibrations. The magnetic-resistant shield structures may include a conductive base layer such a layer of brass. A magnetic-resistant layer may be plated onto the conductive base layer. The magnetic-resistant layer may be formed from an amorphous nickel-phosphorous alloy. The amorphous nickel-phosphorous alloy may be produced by controlling the manufacturing temperature and proportion of phosphorous in the alloy while performing the plating operations within a length of time that ensures non-equilibrium conditions during the plating operations. |
| US09520644B2 |
Antenna and communication apparatus as well as manufacturing method for antenna
This antenna (10) has an underlying print layer (2) which is upon the surface of a material (1) to be printed in a predetermined antenna pattern, and an electro-less plating layer (3) applied to the surface of the underlying print layer (2). The underlying print layer (2) is formed from an ink (2a) and a metallic powder (2b). A portion of the particles of the metallic powder (2b) are entrained within the ink layer in which the ink (2a) has been printed in a substantially uniform thickness. Some particles which are of large particle size project from the ink layer, and a portion of the ink (2a) covering the projecting portions is removed. |
| US09520637B2 |
Agile diverse polarization multi-frequency band antenna feed with rotatable integrated distributed transceivers
A compact, agile polarization diversity, multiple frequency band antenna with integrated electronics for terrestrial terminal use in satellite communications systems includes an antenna feed having highly integrated microwave electronics that are mechanically and electromagnetically coupled thereto in a distributed arrangement so that diverse polarization senses having a low axial ratio and electronic switching control of the polarization senses is provided. The arrangement of the integrated distributed transceiver configuration enables the mechanical rotation of the orientation of a first transceiver for skew alignment while a second transceiver remains stationary relative to the antenna feed assembly. The first transceiver can be a high-band transmitter and receiver pair that supports linear polarization senses, and the second transceiver can be a low-band transmitter and receiver pair that supports circular polarization senses. The antenna system presented is highly compact and offers improved polarization performance previously achievable by only larger devices. |
| US09520633B2 |
Waveguide circulator configuration and method of using same
A waveguide circulator comprising at least three waveguide arms intersecting at a junction, wherein the junction has an upper inner surface and a lower inner surface; and a ferrite element positioned within a recess formed within one of the upper inner surface and the lower inner surface of the junction, the ferrite element including a first portion that projects into the junction and a second portion that extends into the recess. A projection extends from an upper outer surface of the junction opposite the upper inner surface of the junction, the projection being positioned opposite the recess formed on the upper inner surface of the junction. In use, the ferrite element is magnetized by applying a magnetic field thereto using a magnet or electromagnet shaped for matingly engaging the projection. A method for manufacturing a waveguide circulator of the type described above is also provided. |
| US09520632B2 |
CMOS band-pass filter
A band-pass filter is provided that is configured to output a signal with a frequency within a desired frequency range and to attenuate signals with frequencies outside the desired frequency range. The band-pass filter comprises a CMOS resonator that comprises a resonator cavity and a reflector. The band-pass filter also comprises an impedance convertor that is configured to inhibit at least some insertion losses on the band-pass filter. The band-pass filter also comprises a variable capacitor that is connected between the CMOS resonator and the impedance convertor. The desired frequency range of the band-pass filter can be tuned by adjusting the capacitance of the variable capacitor. |
| US09520631B2 |
Spherical filter
An embodiment filter including metallic plating unitarily forming a spherical shell and a resonator, the resonator defining a resonator cavity, a tuning nut disposed in a lower portion of the resonator cavity, and a tuning screw threadably secured within the resonator cavity by the tuning nut, the tuning screw rotatable to deform an upper portion of the resonator to tune the filter. |
| US09520629B2 |
Phase-shift circuit and antenna device
A phase-shift circuit being smaller in size than a conventional phase-shift circuit and being capable of causing a phase difference equivalent to or larger than that in the conventional phase-shift circuit between an input signal and an output signal is achieved. A phase-shift circuit includes: a signal line; and a dielectric member overlapping the signal line and being capable of reciprocating in a direction intersecting the signal line, and changes a phase of a signal propagating through the signal line. The dielectric member is configured of a frame body and a dielectric plate provided inside the frame body and having an overlapping area with the signal line increased or decreased by the reciprocation, and the frame body has a permittivity lower than a permittivity of the dielectric plate. |
| US09520628B2 |
Transistor switches with single-polarity control voltage
Contrary to phase shifters which require complimentary polarity control voltages, a phase shifter may be driven with a single polarity control voltage. The phase shifter comprises an input node in communication with both a high pass network and a low pass network which are both in communication with an output node, where the phase shifter further comprises a first single pole double throw switch and a second single pole double throw switch configured to selectively pass an RF signal from the input node to the output node by way of one of said high pass network and said low pass network. Furthermore, the first and second single pole double throw switches are configured to select between the high pass network and the low pass network based on a single control signal having a voltage greater than or less than a reference voltage. |
| US09520627B2 |
Ion conducting hybrid membranes
A device includes a membrane that is: (i) impermeable to oxygen, and (ii) insoluble in at least one polar solvent; and ion conducting particles in the membrane. At least some of the particles extend from a first side of the membrane to an opposed second side of the membrane. The thickness of the membrane is 15 μm to 100 μm. |
| US09520625B2 |
Cooling device for a battery system, in particular of a motor vehicle
A cooling device for a battery system may include at least two battery units. The cooling device may include at least a first and a second cooling plate able to be flowed through respectively by a coolant. The first and second cooling plate may be arranged respectively for thermal coupling with a respective battery unit. The first and second cooling plate each may include a first fluid inlet, which is connected fluidically with a first fluid outlet via a first fluid duct extending along an extent direction, and a second fluid inlet, which is connected fluidically with a second fluid outlet via a second fluid duct extending along the extent direction. |
| US09520619B2 |
Methods of inerting lithium-containing batteries and associated containers
The present disclosure is related to articles (e.g., containers, battery packs, etc.) including a lithium material (e.g., one or more lithium-containing batteries) housed therein. The articles include sulfur hexafluoride located within an interior compartment of the article to provide an inert atmosphere within the interior compartment. The present disclosure is also related to methods of inerting such articles (e.g., containers, battery packs, etc.) with sulfur hexafluoride. Additionally, the present disclosure is related to conveyed (e.g., pumped, blown, etc.) looped cooling apparatuses and systems. |
| US09520617B2 |
Sulfolane mixtures as ambient aprotic polar solvents
An improved solvent containing sulfolane and at least one dialkyl sulfone, preferably dimethyl sulfone, wherein the improved solvent is a liquid at room temperature and can be used for reaction media and electrochemistry. |
| US09520614B2 |
Packing device for electrode sheets and packing method thereof
A packing device for electrode sheets is provided in the present disclosure. The packing device is used for pasting tapes on a stack structure consisted of the electrode sheets to packing the stack structure. The packing device is included of a tape fetching mechanism, a couple of claws, a carrying mechanism and a positioning mechanism. The tape fetching mechanism is used for moving a tape and putting on the claws. The claws are arranged at interval and a gap is thereby formed between the claws. Each claw is included of a chamfer surface, and the chamfer surfaces are arranged at opposite sides of the gap. The carrying mechanism is used for loading the stack structure. The positioning mechanism is used to drive the claws and the carrying mechanism move related to each other. |
| US09520611B2 |
Redox flow battery
A redox flow battery including a cathode cell having a cathode and a catholyte solution; an anode cell having an anode and an anolyte solution; and an ion exchange membrane disposed between the cathode cell and the anode cell, wherein the catholyte solution and the anolyte solution each include an electrolyte, wherein the electrolyte includes a plurality of metal-ligand coordination compounds, wherein at least one of the metal-ligand coordination compounds includes two or more different ligands, and wherein a dipole moment of the metal-ligand coordination compound is greater than 0. |
| US09520608B2 |
Energy generation system and related uses thereof
A system for converting a waste stream to energy including a water purification device that outputs purified water and a waste stream that includes an electrolyte, a wind and electrolytic energy generation device that receives the waste stream from the water purification device and outputs energy based on the electrolyte present in the waste stream and a power distribution system which receives and stores the energy from the wind and electrolytic energy generation device. The water purification device is further connected to the power distribution system and receives energy enabling further operation of the water purification device. |
| US09520603B2 |
Fuel cell system
A fuel cell system (100) includes: a fuel cell (60); a fuel processor (41) including a reformer (43) and a CO reducer (44, 45); a combustor (42); a first air supply device (46); an electric heater (50); a power supply device (200); a power outage detector (11); and a controller (10). The controller is configured such that, in a power outage state where the power outage detector has detected the power outage before the fuel cell generates electric power, the controller performs at least one of: increasing a supply amount of the combustion air to be greater than in a power supplied state where the power outage detector does not detect the power outage; and decreasing a supply amount of the combustible gas to be less than in the power supplied state, and decreases an amount of heating by the electric heater. |
| US09520598B2 |
Printed energy storage device
A printed energy storage device includes a first electrode including zinc, a second electrode including manganese dioxide, and a separator between the first electrode and the second electrode, the first electrode, second, electrode, and separator printed onto a substrate. The device may include a first current collector and/or a second current collector printed onto the substrate. The energy storage device may include a printed intermediate layer between the separator and the first electrode. The first electrode, and the second electrode may include 1-ethyl-3-methylimidazolium tetrafluoroborate (C2mimBF4). The first electrode and the second electrode may include an electrolyte having zinc tetrafluoroborate (ZnBF4) and 1-ethyl-3-methylimidazolium tetrafluoroborate (C2mimBF4). The first electrode, the second electrode, the first current collector, and/or the second current collector can include carbon nanotubes. The separator may include solid microspheres. |
| US09520595B2 |
Negative electrode for lithium-ion secondary cell and method for manufacturing same
A negative electrode for a lithium-ion secondary cell is configured in a novel manner, having a charge-discharge capacity, as determined per unit weight of the carbon used in the electrode, that is markedly higher than the theoretical capacity of graphite, and having a surface that is stabilized against repeated charging and discharging. A negative electrode for a lithium-ion secondary cell in which a carbon layer obtained by building up and growing a graphene sheet is formed on the surface of a substrate comprising an iron-based metal, the carbon layer being formed in a diagonal direction in relation to the substrate, and the carbon layer being used as the surface of the negative electrode. As measured using an argon laser having a wavelength of 532 nm, the Raman spectrum of the graphite that constitutes the carbon nanochip layer has a g/d ratio of 0.30-0.80. |
| US09520593B2 |
Method of preparing cathode active material precursor for lithium rechargeable battery, cathode active material precursor for lithium rechargeable battery prepared thereby, and cathode active material formed using the cathode active material precursor
The present invention relates to a method of preparing a cathode active material precursor for a lithium rechargeable battery, the cathode active material precursor for the lithium rechargeable battery prepared thereby, and a cathode active material formed using the cathode active material precursor.According to the present invention, the method of preparing a cathode active material precursor for a lithium secondary battery controls the concentration of a concentration gradient part and a shell part in a precursor to obtain a desired concentration of a transition metal in the shell part. As a result, a metal composition is distributed in a continuous concentration gradient from the interface between the core part and the shell part to the surface of the cathode active material, thereby a cathode active material with excellent thermal stability. |
| US09520590B2 |
Sealable terminal for rechargeable battery
A terminal for a battery has a mounting section and a contacting section. There is a torque ring between the mounting section and the contacting section. The mounting section is for holding the terminal within a battery cover, into which it preferably is injection molded. The terminal is a hollow body, which has an outer surface and an inner surface. At the contacting section, the outer surface is conically shaped. At the mounting section, the outer surface has at least one labyrinth ring forming a labyrinth. The inner surface comprises at least two sections. An upper section is essentially surrounded by the contacting section, and preferably has a conical shape. A lower section is essentially surrounded by the mounting section. The lower section preferably has a concave cross-sectional shape. Between the upper section and the lower section, there is an edge. The edge at the inner surface may be essentially surrounded by the torque ring at the outer surface. |
| US09520587B2 |
Bus bar assembly carrier
A battery module includes a housing having an opening and a plurality of electrochemical cells disposed in the housing. The plurality of electrochemical cells have electrode terminals. The battery module also includes a carrier defined by an outside boundary and coupled to the plurality of electrochemical cells. The outside boundary of the carrier and the housing are in a nested arrangement. The battery module also includes a bus bar assembly disposed on the carrier, the bus bar assembly includes bus bars that electrically couple the electrode terminal of one of the plurality of electrochemical cells to a respective electrode terminal of another one of the plurality of electrochemical cells. |
| US09520584B2 |
Secondary battery
A secondary battery including: a battery unit including a battery cell and a lead tab that protrudes from the battery cell; a frame case for supporting the battery unit and including a first support portion for supporting the battery cell and a second support portion for supporting the lead tab; and a connection member for perforating a connection hole formed in the lead tab and extending in a direction of the second support unit, wherein the connection hole of the lead tab includes: a first connection hole that is spaced apart from a first edge of the lead tab by a first width; and a second connection hole that is spaced apart from a second edge of the lead tab by a second width. The secondary battery may reduce electrical resistance of a charge/discharge path and has improved efficiency. |
| US09520582B2 |
Battery holder and mobile illumination device using same
A compartment accommodates a button cell. The compartment includes an opening side through which the button cell is loaded or ejected from a side surface of the buttons cell. The compartment includes an upper side, a lower side, and lateral sides for holding flat surfaces and the side surface of the button cell. The compartment includes elastic pieces for biasing at least one of the flat surfaces or the side surface of the button cell. A slit is disposed on at least one of the upper side, the lower side, or the lateral sides. The slit extends from a side opposite to the opening side toward the opening side. The slit extends to a part of the button cell. |
| US09520581B2 |
Packaging material for cell
A packaging material for a cell including a layered film in which at least a base-material layer, an adhesive layer, a metallic layer, and a sealant layer are layered in the stated order. The packaging material for a cell including a layered body in which at least a base-material layer, an adhesive layer, a metallic layer, and a sealant layer are layered in the stated order, wherein the packaging material for a cell can be imparted with highly exceptional moldability, and dramatically less prone to pinholing and cracking during molding by using, as the metallic layer, an aluminum foil having 0.2% yield strength of 58-121 N/mm2 when a tensile test is performed in the direction parallel to the rolling direction. |
| US09520573B2 |
Device including quantum dots and method for making same
A device comprises an anode; a cathode; a layer therebetween comprising quantum dots; and a first layer comprising a material capable of transporting and injecting electrons in, or forming, contact with the cathode, the material comprising nanoparticles of an inorganic semiconductor material. In one embodiment of the device, quantum dots comprise a core comprising a first semiconductor material that confines holes better than electrons in the core and an outer shell comprising a second semiconductor material that is permeable to electrons. In another embodiment of the device, the nanoparticles comprise n-doped inorganic semiconductor material, and a second layer comprising a material capable of transporting electrons is disposed between the layer including quantum dots and the first layer, wherein the second layer has a lower electron conductivity than the first. In a further embodiment of the device, the first layer is UV treated. A method and other embodiments are also disclosed. |
| US09520569B2 |
Aryl compounds for application in a highly polar solvent
The present invention provides a compound that has high solubility in a highly polar solvent and is usefully usable for an application method using a highly polar solvent, the compound that can manufacture an electroluminescent device having high light-emitting efficiency. Specifically, the present invention provides a compound containing a structure represented by Formula (1): wherein: Ar1, Ar2, Ar3, and Ar4 each independently represent a divalent aromatic group optionally having substituent(s); Ar5 represents a monovalent aromatic group optionally having substituent(s); p and q each independently represent an integer of 0 or more; and R1 represents a given monovalent group. |
| US09520565B2 |
Indaceno derivatives as organic semiconductors
The invention relates to novel organic semiconducting compounds containing one or more dialkylidene-s-indacenodiheteroarene groups, methods for their preparation and educts or intermediates used therein, polymers, blends, mixtures and formulations containing them, the use of the compounds, polymers, blends, mixtures and formulations as semiconductor in organic electronic (OE) devices, especially in organic photovoltaic (OPV) devices, and to OE and OPV devices comprising these compounds, polymers, blends, mixtures or formulations. |
| US09520563B2 |
Patterning of organic semiconductor materials
Organic semiconductor material can be patterned from a solution onto a substrate by selectively wetting the substrate with the solution while applying a mechanical disturbance (such as stirring the solution while the substrate is immersed, or wiping the solution on the substrate). The organic semiconductor material can then be precipitated out of the solution, for example to bridge gaps between source and drain electrodes to form transistor devices. In some embodiments, the solution containing the organic semiconductor material can be mixed in an immiscible host liquid. This can allow the use of higher concentration solutions while also using less of the organic semiconductor material. |
| US09520562B2 |
Method of making a resistive random access memory
The disclosed technology generally relates to semiconductor devices, and relates more particularly to resistive random access memory devices and methods of making the same. In one aspect, a method of forming a resistive random access memory cell of a random access memory device includes forming a first electrode and forming a resistive switching material comprising an oxide of a pnictogen element by atomic layer deposition. The method additionally includes forming a metallic layer comprising the pnictogen element by atomic layer deposition (ALD). The resistive switching material is interposed between the first electrode and the metallic layer. |
| US09520556B2 |
Semiconductor device and method of fabricating the same
Provided are a semiconductor device and a method of fabricating the same. The semiconductor device may include a selection element, a lower electrode pattern provided on the selection element to include a horizontal portion and a vertical portion; and a phase-changeable pattern on the lower electrode pattern. The vertical portion may extend from the horizontal portion toward the phase-changeable pattern and have a top surface, whose area is smaller than that of a bottom surface of the phase-changeable pattern. |
| US09520554B2 |
Clamp elements for phase change memory arrays
Clamp elements, memories, apparatuses, and methods for forming the same are disclosed herein. An example memory may include an array of memory cells and a plurality of clamp elements. A clamp element of the plurality of clamp elements may include a cell structure formed non-orthogonally relative to at least one of a bit line or a word line of the array of memory cells and may be configured to control a voltage of a respective bit line. |
| US09520552B2 |
DIOMEJ cell device
Embodiments of the technology implement DIOMEJ cells. In one embodiment, a DIOMEJ cell includes: an MEJ that includes, a ferromagnetic fixed layer, a ferromagnetic free layer, and a dielectric layer interposed between said fixed and free layers, where the fixed layer is magnetically polarized in a first direction, where the free layer has a first easy axis that is aligned with the first direction, and where the MEJ is configured such that when a potential difference is applied across it, the magnetic anisotropy of the free layer is altered such that the relative strength of the magnetic anisotropy along a second easy axis that is orthogonal to the first easy axis, as compared to the strength of the magnetic anisotropy along the first easy axis, is magnified for the duration of the application of the potential difference; and a diode, where the diode and the MEJ are arranged in series. |
| US09520551B2 |
Hall effect device
A hall effect device includes an active Hall region in a semiconductor substrate, and at least four terminal structures, each terminal structure including a switchable supply contact element and a sense contact element, wherein each supply contact element includes a transistor element with a first transistor terminal, a second transistor terminal, and a control terminal, wherein the second transistor terminal contacts the active Hall region or extends in the active Hall region; and wherein the sense contact elements are arranged in the active Hall region and neighboring to the switchable supply contact elements. |
| US09520547B2 |
Chip mode isolation and cross-talk reduction through buried metal layers and through-vias
A method for fabricating a chip surface base includes preparing a first substrate, preparing a plurality of vias in the first substrate, depositing metal fillings into the plurality of vias, preparing a second substrate, bonding the first and second substrates and exposing the metal fillings. A method for fabricating a chip surface base includes preparing a first and second substrate, depositing a metal on at least one of the first and second substrates, bonding the first and second substrates, preparing a plurality of vias in the first substrate, depositing metal fillings into the plurality of vias and exposing the metal fillings. A chip surface base device includes a first substrate, a second substrate, a metal layer disposed between the first and second substrates and a plurality vias disposed on the first substrate. |
| US09520546B2 |
Light-emitting diode module having light-emitting diode joined through solder paste and light-emitting diode
Disclosed are a light emitting diode and a light emitting diode module. The light emitting diode module includes a printed circuit board and a light emitting diode joined thereto through a solder paste. The light emitting diode includes a first electrode pad electrically connected to a first conductive type semiconductor layer and a second electrode pad connected to a second conductive type semiconductor layer, wherein each of the first electrode pad and the second electrode pad includes at least five pairs of Ti/Ni layers or at least five pairs of Ti/Cr layers and the uppermost layer of Au. Thus a metal element such as Sn in the solder paste is prevented from diffusion so as to provide a reliable light emitting diode module. |
| US09520539B2 |
Optoelectronic component and method for the production thereof
An optoelectronic component includes a plastics housing, wherein a first leadframe section is embedded into the plastics housing, a chip landing face and a soldering contact face of the first leadframe section are at least partly not covered by the plastics housing, the soldering contact face has a groove, and the groove is not covered by the material of the plastics housing. |
| US09520538B2 |
LED epitaxial structure and fabrication method thereof
An LED epitaxial structure includes a substrate; a GaN nucleating layer; a superlattice buffer layer comprising a plurality pairs of alternately stacked AlGaN/n-GaN structures; an n-GaN layer; a MQW light-emitting layer, a p-GaN layer and a p-type contact layer. Al(n) represents Al composition value of the nth AlGaN/n-GaN superlattice buffer layer pair; N(n) represents n-type impurity concentration value of the nth AlGaN/n-GaN superlattice buffer layer pair; variation trend of Al(n) is from gradual increase to gradual decrease, and for N(n) is from gradual increase to gradual decrease. The structure can effectively and sufficiently release the lattice stress due to lattice mismatch between the sapphire substrate and GaN at the bottom layer growth section, thereby greatly reducing wrapping of the epitaxial wafer throughout high-temperature growth process, improving wavelength concentration and yield of the epitaxial wafer, improving GaN lattice quality, reducing lattice dislocation density and improving stability of photoelectric characteristics. |
| US09520535B2 |
Light emitting device and lighting system
A light emitting device includes a first electrode, a first semiconductor layer disposed on the first electrode and including a first conductive dopant, a second semiconductor layer disposed on the first semiconductor layer and including the first conductive dopant having a doping concentration lower than a doping concentration of the first semiconductor layer, a third semiconductor layer disposed on the second semiconductor layer to adjust stress, a first conductive semiconductor layer on the third semiconductor layer, an active layer on the first conductive semiconductor layer, a second conductive semiconductor layer on the active layer; and a second electrode on the second conductive semiconductor layer, the third semiconductor layer has a doping concentration in a range between the doping concentration of the second semiconductor layer and a doping concentration of the first conductive semiconductor layer, and the doping concentration of the third semiconductor layer is increased toward the first conductive semiconductor layer. |
| US09520532B2 |
Light emitting element and light emitting device using the same
An object of the present invention is to provide a light emitting element having slight increase in driving voltage with accumulation of light emitting time. Another object of the invention is to provide a light emitting element having slight increase in resistance value with increase in film thickness. A light emitting element of the invention includes a first layer for generating holes, a second layer for generating electrons and a third layer comprising a light emitting substance between first and second electrodes. The first and third layers are in contact with the first and second electrodes, respectively. The second and third layers are connected to each other so as to inject electrons generated in the second layer into the third layer when applying the voltage to the light emitting element such that a potential of the second electrode is higher than that of the first electrode. |
| US09520527B1 |
Nitride semiconductor template and ultraviolet LED
A nitride semiconductor template includes a Ga2O3 substrate, a buffer layer that includes as a main component AlN and is formed on the Ga2O3 substrate, a first nitride semiconductor layer that includes as a main component AlxGa1-xN (0.2 |
| US09520525B1 |
Method of making an optical detector
An infrared photo-detector with multiple discrete regions of a first absorber material. These regions may have geometric shapes with sloped sidewalls. The detector also may include a second absorber region comprising a second absorber material that absorbs light of a shorter wavelength than the light absorbed by the multiple discrete absorber regions of the first absorber material. The geometric shapes may extend only through the first absorber material. Alternatively, the geometric shapes may extend partially into the second absorber region. The detector has a metal reflector coupled to the multiple discrete absorber regions. The detector also has a substrate containing the discrete absorber regions and the second absorber region. The substrate can further include geometric shaped features etched into the substrate, with those features formed on the side of the substrate opposite the side containing the discrete absorber regions and the second absorber region. |
| US09520524B2 |
Method for producing a solar cell, in particular a silicon thin-film solar cell
A method for producing a solar cell, in particular a silicon thin-film solar cell, wherein a TCO layer (3) is deposited on a glass substrate (1) and at least a silicon layer (4, 5) is deposited on the TCO layer (3), wherein the glass substrate (1) is exposed to electron radiation prior to the application of the TCO layer (3), thereby producing a light-scattering layer (2) of the glass substrate (1), onto which the TCO layer (3) is deposited. Alternatively or additionally, a first silicon layer (4) may be deposited on the TCO layer (3), wherein the first silicon layer (4) is exposed to laser radiation or electron radiation, and wherein a second silicon layer (5) is deposited on the irradiated first silicon layer (4). |
| US09520512B2 |
Titanate interfacial layers in perovskite material devices
Photovoltaic devices such as solar cells, hybrid solar cell-batteries, and other such devices may include an active layer disposed between two electrodes. The active layer may have perovskite material and other material such as mesoporous material, interfacial layers, thin-coat interfacial layers, and combinations thereof. The perovskite material may be photoactive. The active layer may include a titanate. The perovskite material may be disposed between two or more other materials in the photovoltaic device. Inclusion of these materials in various arrangements within an active layer of a photovoltaic device may improve device performance. Other materials may be included to further improve device performance, such as, for example: additional perovskites, and additional interfacial layers. |
| US09520508B2 |
Power inverter docking system for photovoltaic modules
An electronics module docking system includes docking member removably coupled to a photovoltaic module. The docking system includes a first connector port electrically coupled to one or more photovoltaic cells of the photovoltaic module. The photovoltaic module is selectively coupleable to the docking member. The docking system includes a housing to enclose an electronics module. The housing may include second connector port that is selectively engageable to the power electronics module. The power electronics module and the photovoltaic cells are electrically coupled to one another upon selective engagement of the connector ports. The inverter housing is receivable by and removably coupleable to the docking member allowing the inverter housing to be removably coupleable to the photovoltaic module. |
| US09520507B2 |
Solar cells with improved lifetime, passivation and/or efficiency
A method of fabricating a solar cell can include forming a dielectric region on a silicon substrate. The method can also include forming an emitter region over the dielectric region and forming a dopant region on a surface of the silicon substrate. In an embodiment, the method can include heating the silicon substrate at a temperature above 900 degrees Celsius to getter impurities to the emitter region and drive dopants from the dopant region to a portion of the silicon substrate. |
| US09520506B2 |
3D high voltage charge pump
A capacitor and method of forming a capacitor are presented. The capacitor includes a substrate having a capacitor region in which the capacitor is disposed. The capacitor includes first, second and third sub-capacitors (C1, C2 and C3). The C1 comprises a metal oxide semiconductor (MOS) capacitor which includes a gate on the substrate. The gate includes a gate electrode over a gate dielectric. A first C1 plate is served by the gate electrode, a second C1 plate is served by the substrate of the capacitor region and a C1 capacitor dielectric is served by the gate dielectric. The C2 includes a back-end-of-line (BEOL) vertical capacitor disposed in ILD layers with metal levels and via levels. A plurality of metal lines are disposed in the metal levels. The metal lines of a metal level are grouped in alternating first and second groups, the first group serves as first C2 plates and second group serves as second C2 plates and the dielectric layers between the first and second groups serve as C2 capacitor dielectrics. The C3 includes a first C3 plate served by the gate electrode, a second C3 plate served by second group lines in the first metal level of the ILD layers, and a C3 capacitor dielectric is served by the first via level dielectric below M1 and above the gate electrode. A first capacitor terminal is coupled to first capacitor plates of C1, C2 and C3 and a second capacitor terminal is coupled to second capacitor plates of C1, C2 and C3. |
| US09520504B2 |
Semiconductor device and method of manufacturing the same
In an MONOS-type memory cell with a split gate structure, short circuit between a selection gate electrode and a memory gate electrode is prevented, and reliability of a semiconductor device is improved. In a MONOS memory having a selection gate electrode and a memory gate electrode that are adjacent to each other and that extend in a first direction, an upper surface of the selection gate electrode in a region except for a shunt portion at an end portion of the selection gate electrode in the first direction is covered with a cap insulating film. The memory gate electrode is terminated on the cap insulating film side with respect to a border between the cap insulating film and an upper surface of the shunt portion exposed from the cap insulating film. |
| US09520499B2 |
Semiconductor device and method for fabricating the same
Provided are a semiconductor device and a method for fabricating the same. The method for fabricating a semiconductor device comprises, providing an active fin and a field insulating film including a first trench disposed on the active fin; forming a second trench through performing first etching of the field insulating film that is disposed on side walls and a lower portion of the first trench; forming a first region and a second region in the field insulating film through performing second etching of the field insulating film that is disposed on side walls and a lower portion of the second trench, the first region is disposed adjacent to the active fin and has a first thickness, and the second region is disposed spaced apart from the active fin as compared with the first region and has a second thickness that is thicker than the first thickness; and forming a gate structure on the active fin and the field insulating film. |
| US09520487B2 |
Reverse conducting insulated gate bipolar transistor
A semiconductor layer of a reverse conducting insulated gate bipolar transistor is provided with a barrier region of the first conductive type, wherein the barrier region is disposed in the body region and electrically connects to the emitter electrode via a pillar member which extends from the one of main surfaces of the semiconductor layer. The barrier region includes a first barrier partial region, wherein a distance between the first barrier partial region and the drift region is a first distance, and a second barrier partial region, wherein a distance between the second barrier partial region and the drift region is a second distance which is longer than the first distance. The second barrier partial region is in contact with a side surface of an insulated trench gate. |
| US09520485B2 |
3D independent double gate flash memory on bounded conductor layer
A memory device configurable for independent double gate cells, storing multiple bits per cell, includes multilayer stacks of conductive strips configured as word lines. Active pillars are disposed between pairs of first and second stacks, each active pillar comprising a vertical channel structure extending from an underlying bounded conductive layer, a charge storage layer and an insulating layer. The insulating layer in a frustum of an active pillar contacts a first arcuate edge of a first conductive strip in a layer of the first stack and a second arcuate edge of a second conductive strip in a same layer of the second stack. The conductive strips can comprise a metal. The active pillar can be generally elliptical with a major axis parallel with the first and second conductive strips. |
| US09520479B1 |
Low-temperature epitaxial method for manufacturing backside field stop layer of insulated gate bipolar transistor (IGBT)
A low-temperature epitaxial method manufactures backside field stop layer of insulated gate bipolar transistor (IGBT) first provides a first conductive type substrate and fabricates front-side elements and front metal layer on a front side of the IGBT. A second conductive type impurity layer is formed on a back side of the first conductive type substrate by low-temperature epitaxial process and a collector metal layer is formed on bottom face of the first conductive type substrate. |
| US09520477B2 |
Semiconductor device and fabricating method thereof
A semiconductor device includes a substrate, a first and second source/drain regions, and a gate stack. The first and second source/drain regions are disposed on the substrate. The gate stack is disposed over the substrate to overlay a channel region between the first and second S/D regions. The gate stack includes a gate dielectric layer disposed over the substrate; and a metal alloy disposed on the gate dielectric layer and configured as a filling layer in the gate stack; wherein the metal alloy has a first corrosion resistance corresponding to an etchant designed for removing a carbon-containing polymer. |
| US09520474B2 |
Methods of forming a semiconductor device with a gate stack having tapered sidewalls
A semiconductor device includes a metal gate stack. The metal gate stack includes a high-k gate dielectric and a metal gate electrode over the high-k gate dielectric. The metal gate electrode includes a first top surface and a second bottom surface substantially diametrically opposite the first top surface. The first top surface includes a first surface length and the second bottom surface includes a second surface length. The first surface length is larger than the second surface length. A method of forming a semiconductor device is provided. |
| US09520472B2 |
Growth of cubic crystalline phase strucure on silicon substrates and devices comprising the cubic crystalline phase structure
A semiconductor device is disclosed. The semiconductor device includes a substrate comprising a groove. A buffer layer is formed on a surface of the groove. The buffer layer comprising at least one material chosen from AIN, GaN or AlxGa1-xN, where x is between zero and one. An epitaxially grown semiconductor material is disposed over the buffer layer, at least a portion of the epitaxially grown semiconductor material having a cubic crystalline phase structure. Methods of forming the semiconductor devices are also taught. |
| US09520471B1 |
Semiconductor device having gradient implant region and manufacturing method thereof
A semiconductor device includes a substrate having a first conductivity type, a high-voltage well having a second conductivity type and disposed in the substrate, a source well having the first conductivity type disposed in the high-voltage well, a drift region disposed in the high-voltage well and spaced apart from the source well, and a gradient implant region having the second conductivity type and disposed in the high-voltage well between the source well and the drift region. |
| US09520468B2 |
Integrated power device on a semiconductor substrate having an improved trench gate structure
A power device integrated on a semiconductor substrate and having a plurality of conductive bridges within a trench gate structure. In an embodiment, a semiconductor substrate includes a trench having sidewalls and a bottom, the walls and bottom are covered with a first insulating coating layer which then also includes a conductive gate structure. An embodiment provides the formation of the conductive gate structure with covering at least the sidewalls with a second conductive coating layer of a first conductive material. This results in a conductive central region of a second conductive material having a different resistivity than the first conductive material forming a plurality of conductive bridges between said second conductive coating layer and said conductive central region. |
| US09520462B1 |
Semiconductor device having capacitor integrated therein
Semiconductor devices are described that include a capacitor integrated therein. In an implementation, the semiconductor devices include a substrate including a dopant material of a first conductivity type. A plurality of trenches are formed within the substrate. The semiconductor devices also include a diffusion region having dopant material of a second conductivity type formed proximate to the trenches. A capacitor is formed within the trenches and at least partially over the substrate. The capacitor includes at least a first electrode, a second electrode, and a dielectric material formed between the first and second electrodes. |
| US09520456B2 |
Organic EL display device and method of manufacturing organic EL display device
An organic EL display device includes: a lower electrode; an upper electrode; a first organic layer which is disposed between the lower electrode and the upper electrode and is formed of a plurality of layers including a light emitting layer formed of an organic material that emits light; a metal wire that extends between the pixels within the display region; and a second organic layer which is formed of a plurality of layers the same as that of the first organic layer and which comes into contact with a part of the metal wire and does not come into contact with the first organic layer. The upper electrode comes into contact with the metal wire in the periphery of the second organic layer. Accordingly, it is possible to uniformise the potential of the upper electrode without reducing the light emission area. |
| US09520451B2 |
Organic light-emitting diode display device and method of manufacturing the same
An organic light-emitting diode display device includes a substrate, a light-absorption layer, an active array structure, and an organic light-emitting diode. The substrate has a first and a second surface opposite to each other. The light-absorption layer is disposed on the first surface, and has at least one opening exposing a portion of the first surface. The active array structure is positioned on the second surface, and includes at least one data line, at least one gate line, and at least one switching device electrically connected to the gate and data lines. The light-absorption layer overlaps at least one of the data line and the gate line when viewed in a direction perpendicular to the substrate. The organic light-emitting diode is electrically connected to the switching device, and the organic light-emitting diode overlaps the opening when viewed in the direction perpendicular to the substrate. |
| US09520450B2 |
Flexible display apparatus and method of manufacturing the same
A method of manufacturing a flexible display apparatus and a flexible display apparatus, the method including preparing a flexible substrate such that the flexible substrate includes a display area and a peripheral area at an outer portion of the display area; forming an inorganic layer portion on the display area and the peripheral area of the flexible substrate; forming a plurality of organic light emitting devices on the display area of the flexible substrate; detecting a crack of the inorganic layer portion formed on the peripheral area of the flexible substrate; and forming a crack guide hole around the crack. |
| US09520444B1 |
Implementing magnetic memory pillar design
A magnetic memory pillar cell and a method for implementing the magnetic memory cell for use in Solid-State Drives (SSDs) are provided. A magnetic memory cell includes a first conductor M1, and a second conductor M2, the second conductor M1 surrounded by the first conductor M1 and a programmable area using unpatterned programmable magnetic media. At least one of the conductors M1, M2 is formed of a magnetic material, and the conductor M2 is more conductive than conductor M1. An oxide barrier extends between the first conductor M1 and a programmable input to the magnetic memory pillar cell; and the oxide barrier is unpatterned. |
| US09520443B2 |
Systems and methods for implementing magnetoelectric junctions
Embodiments of the technology implement DIOMEJ cells. In one embodiment, a DIOMEJ cell includes: an MEJ that includes, a ferromagnetic fixed layer, a ferromagnetic free layer, and a dielectric layer interposed between the fixed and free layers, where the fixed layer is magnetically polarized in a first direction, where the free layer has a first easy axis that is aligned with the first direction, and where the MEJ is configured such that when a potential difference is applied across it, the magnetic anisotropy of the free layer is altered such that the relative strength of the magnetic anisotropy along a second easy axis that is orthogonal to the first easy axis, as compared to the strength of the magnetic anisotropy along the first easy axis, is magnified for the duration of the application of the potential difference; and a diode, where the diode and the MEJ are arranged in series. |
| US09520439B2 |
X-ray and optical image sensor
An image sensor for capturing X-ray image data and optical image data includes an X-ray absorption layer and a plurality of photodiodes disposed in a semiconductor layer. The X-ray absorption layer is configured to emit photons in response to receiving X-ray radiation. The plurality of photodiodes disposed in the semiconductor layer is optically coupled to receive image light to generate the optical image data, and is optically coupled to receive photons from the X-ray absorption layer to generate X-ray image data. |
| US09520438B2 |
Electromagnetic wave detecting element
The present invention provides an electromagnetic wave detecting element that can suppress occurrence of cracking at a substrate peripheral portion, and occurrence of breakage of lead-out wires. An interlayer insulating film is formed so as to cover TFT switches on a substrate. An interlayer insulating film is formed so as to cover semiconductor layer of sensor portions that generate charges due to electromagnetic waves that are an object of detection being irradiated, and cover a region on the substrate where the interlayer insulating film is formed. |
| US09520430B2 |
Solid state imaging apparatus, production method thereof and electronic device
A solid state imaging apparatus includes an insulation structure formed of an insulation substance penetrating through at least a silicon layer at a light receiving surface side, the insulation structure having a forward tapered shape where a top diameter at an upper portion of the light receiving surface side of the silicon layer is greater than a bottom diameter at a bottom portion of the silicon layer. Also, there are provided a method of producing the solid state imaging apparatus and an electronic device including the solid state imaging apparatus. |
| US09520427B1 |
Image sensor including vertical transfer gate and method for fabricating the same
Provided is an image sensor having improved characteristics. An image sensor in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention may include a photoelectric conversion element formed in a substrate; a transfer gate formed over the photoelectric conversion element, formed over a first surface of the substrate and having at least one through hole, wherein the through hole passes through the transfer gate; a floating diffusion layer formed over the transfer gate; a channel structure formed in the through hole and electrically coupling the photoelectric conversion element to the floating diffusion layer in response to a signal applied to the transfer gate; and a capacitor formed over the floating diffusion layer. |
| US09520423B2 |
Image sensors including non-aligned grid patterns
An image sensor includes a substrate including a first surface and a second surface, a first device isolation layer disposed in the substrate and defining a plurality of pixels in the substrate, and having a lower surface adjacent the first surface of the substrate and an upper surface adjacent the second surface of the substrate. Each of the pixels includes a photoelectric conversion element, a floating diffusion region adjacent the first surface of the substrate, and a grid pattern on the second surface of the substrate. At least one of the grid patterns is not vertically aligned with the first device isolation layer. |
| US09520418B2 |
Active array substrate and manufacturing method thereof
An active array substrate includes a flexible substrate, an inorganic barrier layer, and at least one active component. The inorganic barrier layer covers the flexible substrate. The inorganic barrier layer has a through hole therein. The through hole of the inorganic barrier layer exposes the flexible substrate. The active component is disposed on the inorganic barrier layer. |
| US09520414B2 |
Thin film transistor array substrate and method for manufacturing the same
The present invention proposes a TFT array substrate includes: a substrate; scan lines on the substrate; data lines intercrossing with the scan lines; a first insulating layer between the scan lines and the data lines; a second insulating layer on the first insulating layer and covering the data lines; a common electrode layer on the second insulating layer, comprising first holes located above the data lines. The first holes uncover the second insulating layer. The present invention decreases parasitic capacitance between the common electrode layer and data lines and between the common electrode layer and scan lines by decreasing overlaping sections between a common electrode layer and the data lines and between the common electrode layer and the scan lines. Therefore load of the data lines and the scan lines decreases, charge efficiency of the pixels increases, and display effect of an LCD panel is therefore improved. |
| US09520412B2 |
Thin film transistor panel having an etch stopper on semiconductor
A thin film transistor panel includes an insulating substrate, a gate insulating layer disposed on the insulating substrate, an oxide semiconductor layer disposed on the gate insulating layer, an etch stopper disposed on the oxide semiconductor layer, and a source electrode and a drain electrode disposed on the etch stopper. |
| US09520411B2 |
Display device and electronic device including the same
A display device includes a pixel portion including a plurality of pixels each including a first transistor, a second transistor, and a light-emitting element, in which a gate of the first transistor is electrically connected to a scan line, one of a source and a drain of the first transistor is electrically connected to a signal line, and the other of them is electrically connected to a gate of the second transistor; one of a source and a drain of the second transistor is electrically connected to a power supply line and the other of them is electrically connected to the light-emitting element, and the first transistor includes an oxide semiconductor layer. A period when the display device displays a still image includes a period in which output of a signal to all the scan lines in the pixel portion is stopped. |
| US09520409B2 |
Three-dimensional nonvolatile memory device, semiconductor system including the same, and method of manufacturing the same
A three-dimensional nonvolatile memory device includes a first vertical channel layer and a second vertical channel layer extending from a substrate, a plurality of memory cells, first selection transistors and second selection transistors spaced apart from each other along the first vertical channel layer and the second vertical channel layer, a pad, a contact plug and a bit line in a stacked configuration over the first vertical channel layer, and a common source line formed over the second vertical channel layer. |
| US09520408B2 |
Semiconductor device and method of manufacturing the same
A semiconductor device and a method of manufacturing the same are provided. The semiconductor device includes a core insulating film, a channel film surrounding the core insulating film and extending to a higher level than an upper surface of the core insulating film to have a first end of the channel film exposed over the core insulating film, a channel pad formed over an inner wall of the first end of the channel film exposed over the core insulating film, and a contact plug coupled to the channel pad. |
| US09520407B2 |
Semiconductor memory device and method for manufacturing the same
A semiconductor memory device includes a connecting member including a semiconductor material, a first electrode film, a first insulating film, a stacked body and three or more semiconductor pillars. The stacked body includes second electrode films and second insulating films that alternately stacked. The semiconductor pillars are arrayed along two or more directions, extend in a stacking direction, pierce through the stacked body and the first insulating film, and are connected to the connecting member. The device includes a third insulating film provided between the semiconductor pillars and the stacked body and between the connecting member and the first electrode film. A charge storage layer is provided at least between one of the second electrode films and the third insulating film. |
| US09520400B2 |
NOR structure flash memory and manufacturing method thereof
A NOR flash memory and its manufacturing method are provided in the present disclosure, they are in the field of flash memory. In the manufacturing method, a mask dielectric layer is formed on a second polysilicon layer of a gate stack structure. In addition, part of the mask dielectric layer is etched patternedly to expose part of the second polysilicon layer which is close to a source. Furthermore, the exposed second polysilicon layer is self aligned to form a metal silicide layer. Thus in the NOR flash memory, an unetched mask dielectric layer is substantially located between a metal silicide layer and a drain contacting hole of the NOR flash memory. A drain current between the gate electrode and the drain electrode is small, the above manufacturing method is not complex, a process window is large, a side effect is small, which are advantageous to large scale production. |
| US09520396B2 |
Method for making high voltage integrated circuit devices in a fin-type process and resulting devices
Methods for making high voltage IC devices utilizing a fin-type process and resulting devices are disclosed. Embodiments include forming two pluralities of silicon fins on a substrate layer, separated by a space, wherein adjacent silicon fins are separated by a trench; forming an oxide layer on the substrate layer and filling a portion of each trench; forming two deep isolation trenches into the oxide layer and the substrate layer adjacent to the two pluralities of silicon fins; forming a graded voltage junction by implanting a dopant into the substrate layer below the two pluralities of silicon fins; forming a gate structure on the oxide layer and between the two pluralities of silicon fins; implanting a dopant into and under the two pluralities of silicon fins, forming source and drain regions; and forming an epitaxial layer onto the two pluralities of silicon fins to form merged source and drain fins. |
| US09520394B1 |
Contact structure and extension formation for III-V nFET
FinFET devices including III-V fin structures and silicon-based source/drain regions are formed on a semiconductor substrate. Silicon is diffused into the III-V fin structures to form n-type junctions. Leakage through the substrate is addressed by forming p-n junctions adjoining the source/drain regions and isolating the III-V fin structures under the channel regions. |
| US09520391B1 |
Field effect transistor having delay element with back gate
Methods form complementary metal oxide semiconductor (CMOS) devices that include a first transistor and a complementary second transistor, and an output connected to the first transistor and the second transistor. The first transistor includes a first channel region, a first back gate, a first delay element between the output and the first back gate, and a first back gate insulator separating the first back gate from the first channel region. The second transistor includes a second channel region, a second back gate, a second delay element between the output and the second back gate, and a second back gate insulator separating the second back gate from the second channel region. The first delay element, the first back gate insulator, and the first channel region form a first resistor-capacitor (RC) circuit, and the second delay element, the second back gate insulator, and the second channel region form a second RC circuit. |
| US09520378B2 |
Thermal matched composite die
A thermal matched composite material, suitable for use as a die is described. In one example, the material includes a metal plate and a substrate having a coefficient of thermal expansion (CTE) lower than the metal plate to carry microelectronic circuits. An adhesive layer between the substrate and the metal plate physically attaches the metal plate to the substrate so that the combined metal plate and substrate have a higher CTE than the substrate alone. |
| US09520377B2 |
Semiconductor device package including bonding layer having Ag3Sn
Semiconductor device packages and methods of manufacturing the semiconductor device packages are provided. A semiconductor device package may include a bonding layer between a substrate and a semiconductor chip, and the bonding layer may include an intermetallic compound. The intermetallic compound may be a compound of metal and solder material. The intermetallic compound may include Ag3Sn. A method of manufacturing the semiconductor device package may include forming a bonding layer, which bonds a semiconductor chip to a substrate, by using a mixed paste including metal particles and a solder material. The bonding layer may be formed by forming an intermetallic compound, which is formed by heating the mixed paste to react the metal particles with the solder material. |
| US09520376B2 |
Bumpless build-up layer package including an integrated heat spreader
An example includes a die package including a microelectronic die having a lower die surface, an upper die surface parallel to the lower die surface, and a die side, the microelectronic die including an active region and an inactive region. The example optionally includes a heat spreader having a lower heat spreader surface, an upper heat spreader surface parallel to the lower heat spreader surface, and at least one heat spreader side, the heat spreader disposed on the upper surface of the microelectronic die in thermal communication with the inactive region of the die and electrically insulated from the active region. The example optionally includes an encapsulation material encapsulating the die side and the heat spreader side and lower heat spreader surface, the encapsulation material including a lower surface substantially parallel to the die lower surface and an upper surface substantially parallel to the die upper surface. |
| US09520375B2 |
Method of forming a solder bump on a substrate
A method of forming a solder bump on a substrate includes: forming a conductive layer(s) on the substrate having a surface on which an electrode pad is prepared; forming a resist layer on the conductive layer(s) having an opening over the electrode pad; forming a metal pillar in the opening of the resist layer, wherein the metal pillar includes a first conductive material; forming a space between sidewalls of the resist layer and the metal pillar; forming a metal barrier layer in the space and on a top surface of the metal pillar, the metal barrier layer including a second conductive material that is different from the first conductive material of the metal pillar; forming a solder layer on the metal barrier layer over the top surface of the metal pillar; removing the resist layer; removing the conductive layer(s); and forming the solder bump by reflowing the solder layer. |
| US09520374B2 |
Semiconductor device, substrate and semiconductor device manufacturing method
The semiconductor device can prevent damages on a semiconductor chip even when a soldering material is used for bonding the back surface of the semiconductor chip to the junction plane of a chip junction portion such as an island or a die pad. This semiconductor device includes a semiconductor chip and a chip junction portion having a junction plane that is bonded to the back surface of the semiconductor chip with a soldering material. The junction plane is smaller in size than the back surface of the semiconductor chip. This semiconductor device may further include a plurality of extending portions which extend respectively from the periphery of the junction plane to directions parallel with the junction plane. |
| US09520370B2 |
Methods of forming semiconductor device assemblies and interconnect structures, and related semiconductor device assemblies and interconnect structures
A method of forming a semiconductor device assembly comprises forming on a first substrate, at least one bond pad comprising a first nickel material over the first substrate, a first copper material on the first nickel material, and a solder-wetting material on the first copper material. On a second substrate is formed at least one conductive pillar comprising a second nickel material, a second copper material directly contacting the second nickel material, and a solder material directly contacting the second copper material. The solder-wetting material is contacted with the solder material. The first copper material, the solder-wetting material, the second copper material, and the solder material are converted into a substantially homogeneous intermetallic compound interconnect structure. Additional methods, semiconductor device assemblies, and interconnect structures are also described. |
| US09520362B2 |
Semiconductor device having interconnect layer that includes dielectric segments interleaved with metal components
The present disclosure provides a method of fabricating a semiconductor device. The method includes forming a patterned dielectric layer having a plurality of first openings. The method includes forming a conductive liner layer over the patterned dielectric layer, the conductive liner layer partially filling the first openings. The method includes forming a trench mask layer over portions of the conductive liner layer outside the first openings, thereby forming a plurality of second openings, a subset of which are formed over the first openings. The method includes depositing a conductive material in the first openings to form a plurality of vias and in the second openings to form a plurality of metal lines. The method includes removing the trench mask layer. |
| US09520361B2 |
Semiconductor devices
Semiconductor devices are provided. A semiconductor device includes a substrate, a first conductive structure on the substrate, and a second conductive structure on the first conductive structure. The semiconductor device includes first and second metal-diffusion-blocking layers on respective sidewalls of the first and second conductive structures. The semiconductor device includes an insulating layer between the first and second metal-diffusion-blocking layers. Moreover, the semiconductor device includes a metal-diffusion-shield pattern in the insulating layer and spaced apart from the first conductive structure. |
| US09520353B2 |
Metal-insulation-metal device
A metal-insulation-metal (MIM) device including a first metal layer, a first insulation layer, a second metal layer, and a second insulation layer is provided. The first insulation layer is disposed on the first metal layer. The second metal layer is disposed on a part of the first insulation layer. The second insulation layer is disposed on a side wall of the second metal layer and on another part of the first insulation layer. A width of the first insulation layer under the second metal layer and the second insulation layer parallel to the first metal layer is greater than a with of the second metal layer parallel to the first metal layer. |
| US09520352B2 |
Wiring board and semiconductor device
A wiring board includes a first wiring layer, a first insulating layer, first via wirings, connection terminals and a protection layer. The first insulating layer is formed with through holes. The first via wirings are formed in the through holes. The connection terminals are electrically connected to the first wiring layer through the first via wirings. The connection terminals protrude upward from the first insulating layer. The protection layer is made of insulating resin which contains photosensitive resin as a main component. The protection layer is formed on an upper surface of the first insulating layer. The protection layer includes first and second protection layers. The first protection layer surrounds the connection terminals. The second protection layer is separated from the first protection layer. The second protection layer is thinner than the first protection layer. |
| US09520351B2 |
Packaging substrate and package structure
A packaging substrate and a package structure are provided. The packaging substrate includes a plurality of dielectric layers, two of which have a difference in thickness; and a plurality of circuit layers alternately stacked with the dielectric layers. Therefore, the package warpage encountered in the prior art is avoided. |
| US09520350B2 |
Bumpless build-up layer (BBUL) semiconductor package with ultra-thin dielectric layer
Bumpless build-up layer (BBUL) semiconductor packages with ultra-thin dielectric layers are described. For example, an apparatus includes a semiconductor die including an integrated circuit having a plurality of external conductive bumps. A semiconductor package houses the semiconductor die. The semiconductor package includes a dielectric layer disposed above the plurality of external conductive bumps. A conductive via is disposed in the dielectric layer and coupled to one of the plurality of conductive bumps. A conductive line is disposed on the dielectric layer and coupled to the conductive via. |
| US09520347B2 |
Lead frame construct for lead-free solder connections
An electronics packaging arrangement, a lead frame construct for use in an electronics packaging arrangement, and a method for manufacturing an electronics packaging arrangement. A lead frame made of copper, for example, includes a metallic barrier layer of nickel, for example, to prevent oxidation of the metal of the lead frame. A relatively thin wetting promoting layer of copper, for example, is provided on the metallic barrier layer to promote uniform wetting of a solder, such as a lead-free, zinc-based solder, onto the lead frame during a die connect process by which a chip is connected to the lead frame. A copper/zinc intermetallic layer is formed during the flow and solidification of the solder. Substantially all of the copper in the copper layer is consumed during formation of the copper/zinc intermetallic layer, and the intermetallic layer is sufficiently thin to resist internal cracking failure during manufacture and subsequent use of the electronics packaging arrangement. |
| US09520345B2 |
Semiconductor module, semiconductor device having semiconductor module, and method of manufacturing semiconductor module
A semiconductor module is configured such that heat radiation substrates are connected to lead frames and semiconductor chips are directly connected to the lead frames, so that the semiconductor chips are not connected to the lead frames through conductive portions of the heat radiation substrates. Therefore, the conductive portions can have a solid shape without being divided. As such, an occurrence of curving of the heat radiation substrates is suppressed when a temperature is reduced from a high temperature to a room temperature after resin-sealing at the high temperature or the like. Therefore, connection between the semiconductor chip and the lead frames and connection between the lead frames and the heat radiation substrates enhance. |
| US09520344B2 |
Semiconductor module for electric power
Included are: the third frame which is electrically connected to the first intermediate frame and is arranged above the first frame; the fourth frame which is electrically connected to the second intermediate frame and is arranged above the second frame; the electric source terminal part which is provided on an extension of the first frame; the ground terminal part which is provided on an extension of the fourth frame; and the output terminal part which is provided on an extension to which the second frame and the third frame are electrically joined, wherein the third frame and the fourth frame are arranged in parallel with each other, and the electric source terminal part, the ground terminal part and the output terminal part are arranged in a manner such that induced electric voltages, which are generated in the third frame and the fourth frame, become in reverse directions with each other. |
| US09520342B2 |
Power management applications of interconnect substrates
Various applications of interconnect substrates in power management systems are described. |
| US09520341B2 |
Semiconductor package with conductive clips
One exemplary disclosed embodiment comprises a high power semiconductor package configured as a buck converter having a control transistor and a sync transistor disposed on a common leadframe pad, a driver integrated circuit (IC) for driving the control and sync transistors, and conductive clips electrically coupling the top surfaces of the transistors to substrate pads such as leadframe pads. In this manner, the leadframe and the conductive clips provide efficient grounding or current conduction by direct mechanical connection and large surface area conduction, thereby enabling a package with significantly reduced electrical resistance, form factor, complexity, and cost when compared to conventional packaging methods using wirebonds for transistor interconnections. |
| US09520339B2 |
Semiconductor device and method of manufacturing the same
According to one embodiment, a semiconductor device includes a semiconductor substrate having a first surface and a second surface, and having a LSI on the first surface of the semiconductor substrate, a first insulating layer with an opening, the first insulating layer provided on the first surface of the semiconductor substrate, a conductive layer on the opening, the conductive layer being connected to the LSI, and a via extending from a second surface of the semiconductor substrate to the conductive layer through the opening, the via having a size larger than a size of the opening in a range from the second surface to a first interface between the semiconductor substrate and the first insulating layer, and having a size equal to the size of the opening in the opening. |
| US09520330B2 |
Integrated circuit comprising PMOS transistors with different voltage thresholds
There is provided a method for the manufacture of an integrated circuit, including a substrate and an insulating layer formed on the substrate; a first pMOS transistor formed on the insulating layer and including a channel formed in a first layer of a silicon—germanium alloy, having a first thickness and first average germanium density; a gate oxide layer having a first equivalent oxide thickness; a second pMOS transistor formed on the insulating layer and further including a channel formed in a second layer of a silicon—germanium alloy, having a second thickness which is greater than the first and a second average germanium density which is lower than the first; and a gate oxide layer having a second equivalent oxide thickness which is greater than the first. |
| US09520328B2 |
Type III-V and type IV semiconductor device formation
Forming a semiconductor device is disclosed, according to embodiments of the present disclosure. Forming the semiconductor device can include forming a first semiconductor layer directly on a silicon substrate. Forming the semiconductor device can include forming a second semiconductor layer directly on the first semiconductor layer and forming an insulating trench in the second semiconductor layer. Forming the semiconductor device can include removing the second portion of the second semiconductor layer, and forming a third semiconductor layer directly on the first semiconductor layer and adjacent to the insulating trench such that the first portion of second semiconductor layer is electrically insulated from the third semiconductor layer. The first semiconductor layer and the third semiconductor layer can each be a type III-V semiconductor and the second semiconductor layer can be a type IV semiconductor. |
| US09520327B2 |
Methods of forming low resistance contacts
Methods for forming electrical contacts are provided. First and second FETs are formed over a semiconductor substrate. Openings are etched in a dielectric layer formed over the substrate, where the openings extend to source and drain regions of the FETs. A hard mask is formed over the source and drain regions of FETs. A first portion of the hard mask is removed, where the first portion is formed over the source and drain regions of the first FET. First silicide layers are formed over the source and drain regions of the first FET. A second portion of the hard mask is removed, where the second portion is formed over the source and drain regions of the second FET. Second silicide layers are formed over the source and drain regions of the second FET. A metal layer is deposited within the openings to fill the openings. |
| US09520326B2 |
Semiconductor device with high breakdown voltage and manufacture thereof
A semiconductor device includes: first and second n-type wells formed in p-type semiconductor substrate, the second n-type well being deeper than the first n-type well; first and second p-type backgate regions formed in the first and second n-type wells; first and second n-type source regions formed in the first and second p-type backgate regions; first and second n-type drain regions formed in the first and second n-type wells, at positions opposed to the first and second n-type source regions, sandwiching the first and the second p-type backgate regions; and field insulation films formed on the substrate, at positions between the first and second p-type backgate regions and the first and second n-type drain regions; whereby first transistor is formed in the first n-type well, and second transistor is formed in the second n-type well with a higher reverse voltage durability than the first transistor. |
| US09520324B1 |
Integrated circuit system with external resistor to provide constant current bias and method of manufacture thereof
An integrated circuit system, and a method of manufacture thereof, includes an integrated circuit package connected to a package interconnect connectible to an external resistor, wherein the integrated circuit package includes a master integrated circuit and a slave integrated circuit, the master integrated circuit is connectible to the external resistor and the slave integrated circuit, the master integrated circuit includes a master constant current and a slave constant current, the master constant current flows through the external resistor, and the slave constant current is based on the master constant current. |
| US09520320B2 |
TFT array substrate, method of manufacturing the same, and display device
A TFT substrate and a method of manufacturing the TFT array substrate are disclosed. The method includes providing a substrate, forming an organic layer on the substrate, forming a first transparent conductive layer on the organic layer, and forming a photolithography layer on the first transparent conductive layer, where the photolithography layer has an opening. The method also includes patterning the first transparent conductive layer to form a first via hole in the first transparent layer using the photolithography layer as a mask, where the first via hole is aligned with the opening in the photolithography layer, and patterning the organic layer to form a second via hole in the organic using the photolithography layer as a mask, where the second via hole is aligned with the opening in the photolithography layer. |
| US09520314B2 |
High temperature electrostatic chuck bonding adhesive
Methods and apparatus for bonding an electrostatic chuck to a component of a substrate support are provided herein. In some embodiments, an adhesive for bonding components of a substrate support may include a matrix of silicon-based polymeric material having a filler dispersed therein. The silicon based polymeric material may be a polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) structure having a molecular weight with a low molecular weight (LMW) content Σ D3-D10 of less than about 500 ppm. In some embodiments, the filler may comprise between about 50 to about 70 percent by volume of the adhesive layer. In some embodiments, the filler may comprise particles of aluminum oxide (Al2O3), aluminum nitride (AlN), yttrium oxide (Y2O3), or combinations thereof. In some embodiments, the filler may comprise particles having a diameter of about 10 nanometers to about 10 microns. |
| US09520310B2 |
Wafer container with door interface seal
A wafer container may be a front opening wafer container comprising a container portion and a door, one of the container portion and the door having a radially installed seal with a plurality of opposing lateral projections that deflect from a normal position in a direction away from an install direction when the seal is installed in a groove, the lateral projections resisting removal of the seal after the seal is seated in the groove. A core portion and a cantilevered finger member engages the other of the door and container portion when the door is seated in the container portion. Other lateral projections on the seal effectively seal the path between the seal and groove surfaces. |
| US09520309B2 |
Substrate processing apparatus and substrate processing method
A substrate processing apparatus for processing a substrate includes a transfer device which has a drive motor and transfers a substrate, a peripheral device which has a drive motor and loads and unloads the substrate in substrate-transfer operation of the transfer device, and a control device which conducts drive control on the drive motor of the transfer device and drive control of the drive motor of the peripheral device. |
| US09520307B2 |
Method and nozzle for hermetically sealed packaged devices
Microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) such as digital micromirror devices (DMD) are manufactured in arrays. Covers, packages, and lids are placed around each device and a liquid such as epoxy resin is dispensed around the packaged device. The epoxy resin acts as a sealant to form a hermetic seal. A nozzle comprises multiple orifices along a sidewall of the nozzle to dispense the epoxy resin horizontally and parallel to the plane of the wafer substrate. The distal ends of the nozzle are enclosed. |
| US09520300B2 |
Semiconductor devices and methods of fabricating the same
The present disclosure describes semiconductor devices and methods of fabricating the same. The method includes forming an interlayer insulating layer on a substrate and forming conductive patterns in the interlayer insulating layer. A pore density of an upper portion of the interlayer insulating layer is higher than that of a lower portion of the interlayer insulating layer, and a pore density of an intermediate portion of the interlayer insulating layer gradually increases toward the upper portion of the interlayer insulating layer. An air gap is provided between the conductive patterns. |
| US09520295B2 |
Metal doping of amorphous carbon and silicon films used as hardmasks in substrate processing systems
Systems and methods for depositing a metal-doped amorphous carbon hardmask film or a metal-doped amorphous silicon hardmask film includes arranging a substrate in a processing chamber; supplying a carrier gas to the processing chamber; supplying a hydrocarbon precursor gas or a silicon precursor gas to the processing chamber, respectively; supplying a metal-based precursor gas to the processing chamber; one of creating or supplying plasma in the processing chamber; and depositing a metal-doped amorphous carbon hardmask film or a metal-doped amorphous silicon hardmask film on the substrate, respectively. |
| US09520294B2 |
Atomic layer etch process using an electron beam
Atomic layer etching using alternating passivation and etching processes is performed with an electron beam plasma source, in which the ion energy is set to a low level below the etch threshold of the material to be etched during passivation and to a higher level above the etch threshold during etching but below the etch threshold of the unpassivated material. |
| US09520288B2 |
Semiconductor device including IGZO layer and manufacturing method thereof
It is an object to provide a thin film transistor having favorable electric characteristics and high reliability and a semiconductor device which includes the thin film transistor as a switching element. An In—Ga—Zn—O-based film having an incubation state that shows an electron diffraction pattern, which is different from a conventionally known amorphous state where a halo shape pattern appears and from a conventionally known crystal state where a spot appears clearly, is formed. The In—Ga—Zn—O-based film having an incubation state is used for a channel formation region of a channel etched thin film transistor. |
| US09520285B2 |
Silicon carbide epitaxy
A method comprises providing a monocrystalline silicon wafer (11) having a principal surface (17) which supports a masking layer (24), for example silicon dioxide or polycrystalline silicon, having windows (25) to expose corresponding regions of the silicon wafer, forming silicon carbide seed regions (30) on the exposed regions of the wafer, for example by forming carbon and converting the carbon into silicon carbide, and growing monocrystalline silicon carbide (31) on the silicon carbide seed regions. Thus, monocrystalline silicon carbide can be formed selectively on the silicon wafer which can help to avoid wafer bow. |
| US09520278B2 |
Nebulizer and analyzer
An object is to mix multiple liquids sufficiently and then nebulize the mixed liquids while maintaining the nebulizing efficiency. A nebulizer includes a first inner tube disposed inside an outer tube and having therein a first sample passage through which a first liquid sample flows, a second inner tube disposed inside the outer tube in parallel with the first inner tube and having therein a second sample passage through which a second liquid sample flows, a membranous member disposed with a gap between the membranous member and sample outlets formed at respective ends of the inner tubes. The gap forms mixing space in which a gas passing through a gas passage converts the first and second liquid samples flowing out of the sample outlets into droplets and mixes the droplets and the membranous member has multiple holes through which the mixed liquid samples pass along with the gas. |
| US09520276B2 |
Electrode assembly and plasma processing apparatus
An electrode assembly of a plasma processing apparatus that enables damage to an electrode plate to be prevented, and enables an increase in the number of parts to be prevented, so that the ability to carry out maintenance can be easily maintained. An upper electrode assembly has an upper electrode plate, a cooling plate (C/P) and a spacer interposed between the upper electrode plate and the C/P. The upper electrode plate has therein electrode plate gas-passing holes that penetrate through the upper electrode plate. The C/P has therein C/P gas-passing holes that penetrate through the C/P. The spacer has therein spacer gas-passing holes that penetrate through the spacer. The electrode plate gas-passing holes, the C/P gas-passing holes and the spacer gas-passing holes are not disposed collinearly. |
| US09520272B2 |
Microwave emission mechanism, microwave plasma source and surface wave plasma processing apparatus
A microwave emission mechanism includes: a transmission path through which a microwave is transmitted; and an antenna section that emits into a chamber the microwave transmitted through the transmission path. The antenna section includes an antenna having a slot through which the microwave is emitted, a dielectric member through which the microwave emitted from the antenna is transmitted and a closed circuit in which a surface current and a displacement current flow. A surface wave is formed in a surface of the dielectric member. The closed circuit has at least: an inner wall of the slot; and the surface and an inner portion of the dielectric member. When a wavelength of the microwave is λ0, a length of the closed circuit is nλ0±δ, where n is a positive integer and δ is a fine-tuning component including 0. |
| US09520269B2 |
Adjustable non-dissipative voltage boosting snubber network for achieving large boost voltages
This disclosure describes a non-dissipative snubber circuit configured to boost a voltage applied to a load after the load's impedance rises rapidly. The voltage boost can thereby cause more rapid current ramping after a decrease in power delivery to the load which results from the load impedance rise. In particular, the snubber can comprise a combination of a unidirectional switch, a voltage multiplier, and a current limiter. In some cases, these components can be a diode, voltage doubler, and an inductor, respectively. |
| US09520266B2 |
Pattern critical dimension measurement equipment and method for measuring pattern critical dimension
Pattern critical dimension measurement equipment includes an electron source configured to generate a primary electron beam, a deflector configured to deflect the primary electron beam emitted from the electron source, a focusing lens configured to focus the primary electron beam deflected by the deflector, a decelerator configured to decelerate the primary electron beam that irradiates the sample, a first detector located between the electron source and the focusing lens, the first detector being configured to detect electrons at part of azimuths of electrons generated from the sample upon irradiation of the sample with the primary electron beam, and a second detector located between the electron source and the first detector, the second detector being configured to detect electrons at substantially all azimuths of the electrons generated from the sample. |
| US09520265B2 |
Ion implantation apparatus
A multistage quadrupole lens system in an ion implantation apparatus includes a first quadrupole lens and a third quadrupole lens. A first bore radius of the first quadrupole lens may be smaller than a third bore radius of the third quadrupole lens. The multistage quadrupole lens system may further include a second quadrupole lens placed between the first quadrupole lens and the third quadrupole lens. A second bore radius of the second quadrupole lens may take a value lying between the first bore radius of the first quadrupole lens and the third bore radius of the third quadrupole lens (i.e., an intermediate value between them). |
| US09520259B2 |
Ion beam uniformity control
A plasma chamber having improved controllability of the ion density of the extracted ribbon ion beam is disclosed. A plurality of pairs of RF biased electrodes is disposed on opposite sides of the extraction aperture in a plasma chamber. In some embodiments, one of each pair of RF biased electrodes is biased at the extraction voltage, while the other of each pair is coupled to a RF bias power supply, which provides a RF voltage having a DC component and an AC component. In another embodiment, both of the electrodes in each pair are coupled to a RF biased power supply. A blocker may be disposed in the plasma chamber near the extraction aperture. In some embodiments, RF biased electrodes are disposed on the blocker. |
| US09520256B2 |
Electromagnetic contactor including contact bearing portions for bearing fixed contacts
An electromagnetic contactor includes a contact device including a pair of fixed contacts and a movable contact contacting to and separating from the pair of fixed contacts. The pair of fixed contacts includes support conductor portions supported with an upper surface of a contact housing case, and C-shaped portions each including an upper plate portion linked to an end portion of the support conductor portion, an intermediate plate portion extending downward from a side of the upper plate portion opposite to that of the other support conductor portion, and a lower plate portion extending from a lower end of the intermediate plate portion toward a side of the other support conductor portion and formed with a contact portion on an upper surface thereof. The contact housing case includes contact bearing portions bearing a side of the lower plate portions of the pair of fixed contacts opposite to the movable contact. |
| US09520253B2 |
Button, button arrangement and electronic device employing same
A button is mounted to a housing of an electronic device, the button includes a pressing body and a sealed body. The pressing body is mounted to the housing. The sealed body is coupled to the pressing body, the sealed body defines a slot around an external peripheral wall and forms two opposite elastic walls, the two elastic walls resist to the pressing body and the housing, respectively. An electronic device and a button arrangement employing the button are also disclosed. |
| US09520252B2 |
Adaptable hazard detector mounting plate
According to one embodiment, a mounting plate for coupling a hazard detector with a wall or ceiling of a structure is provided. The mounting plate includes a plate that is positionable against the wall or ceiling to removably couple the hazard detector to the wall or ceiling. The mounting plate also includes a centrally located opening, a first set of apertures arranged around the centrally located opening, and a second set of apertures arranged around the centrally located opening. The first set of apertures are dimensioned and arranged according to a first attachment standard that defines a first distance range relative to an axis of the centrally located aperture and the second set of apertures are dimensioned and arranged according to a second attachment standard that defines a second distance range relative to the axis of the centrally located aperture. |
| US09520250B2 |
Mobile device assisted smart building control
A central controller for device automation can control output devices (e.g. automated lights and speakers) based on calculating the indoor location of a person. In familiar surroundings (e.g. homes), people may leave their favorite wireless devices unattended (e.g. smartphones and tablet PCs) and in general people exhibit varying proximity to their mobile wireless devices. Hence, indoor locations calculated for mobile wireless devices are of variable importance when calculating indoor occupant locations. (e.g. exhibiting highly-correlated locations when handheld). In one embodiment, the central controller aggregates wireless signals from mobile wireless devices. The central controller calculates one or more mobile device location estimates and person-to-device proximities from the wireless signals. The central controller uses each person-to-device proximity to weight the corresponding mobile device location in a calculation to estimate the occupancy of the region of the building and controls an output device based on the occupancy estimate. |
| US09520247B1 |
Automated operation of fixtures
Control devices for automatically and/or remotely controlling fixtures such as, for example, light fixtures and/or other electrical and/or electronic devices, by controlling, operating, and/or interacting with existing switches, controls, power sources, and/or other components already present in an environment of interest, and methods for their installation and use. |
| US09520240B2 |
Lithium titanium oxide (LTO)/carbon composite, preparation method for LTO/carbon composite, negative electrode material using LTO/carbon composite, and hybrid super capacitor using negative electrode material
A lithium titanium oxide (LTO)/carbon composite, a preparation method for the LTO/carbon composite, a negative electrode material using the LTO/carbon composite, and a hybrid super capacitor using the negative electrode material are disclosed. The lithium titanium oxide (LTO)/carbon composite is formed to insert a carbon-based additive into a plurality of voids formed on the LTO granules, thereby improving the electrical conductivity. |
| US09520235B2 |
Clad metal bus bar for film capacitor and film capacitor comprising the same
A clad metal bus bar for a film capacitor may include a clad metal layer including: an aluminum layer; a first copper layer stacked on one surface of the aluminum layer; and a second copper layer stacked on the other surface of the aluminum layer. |
| US09520234B2 |
Multilayer ceramic capacitor, manufacturing method thereof and board for mounting the same thereon
A multilayer ceramic capacitor and manufacturing method therefor, in which the capacitor includes a ceramic body including dielectric layers and internal electrodes; electrode layers connected to the internal electrodes; and a conductive resin layer formed on the electrode layers and including a first conductor, a second conductor having a fiber shape, and a base resin. |
| US09520232B2 |
Multilayer ceramic electronic component
A multilayer ceramic electronic component having outer electrodes that each include an end-face outer electrode disposed on an end face of a ceramic multilayer body and side-face outer electrodes formed by a sputtering method on side faces of the ceramic multilayer body and electrically connected to the end-face outer electrode. A sputtering electrode layer of each of the side-face outer electrodes in contact with the ceramic multilayer body is composed of a material containing 3% by mass or more of a metal having a standard oxidation-reduction potential of −2.36 to −0.74 V, and an outermost sputtering electrode layer which is an outermost layer of each of the side-face outer electrodes is composed of at least one of Sn and Bi or an alloy containing 5% by mass or more of at least one of Sn and Bi. |
| US09520228B2 |
Wireless energy transfer
A system includes at least one active energy transfer coil and a first passive energy transfer coil. The active energy transfer coil is configured to couple with a power supply. The at least one active energy transfer coil has an active coupling range. The first passive energy transfer coil is magnetically coupled to the active energy transfer coil and is located within the active coupling range. The first passive energy transfer coil has a passive coupling range. The first passive energy transfer coil is configured to provide energy to a first device located within the passive coupling range and based on energy received from the at least one active energy transfer coil. |
| US09520227B2 |
Apparatus for contactless transmission of electrical energy between a wall and a door leaf/window sash fastened to said wall
An apparatus for a contactless transmission of electrical energy between a wall and a door leaf/window sash fastened to the wall in an articulated fashion via hinges about a hinge axis includes a primary coil configured to be fastened to the wall, a secondary coil fastened to the door leaf/window sash, and a hinge bolt as a magnetic flux conduction body between the primary coil and the secondary coil. The hinge bolt comprises at least one flux element provided as a prefabricated structural component and at least one bearing piece comprising a mating frontal side. The at least one flux element comprises at least one frontal side. The at least one frontal side of the at least one flux element braces against the mating frontal side of the at least one bearing piece. |
| US09520226B2 |
Counter wound inductive power supply
A contactless power supply is provided. The contactless power supply includes two or more primary coils for generating a region of cooperative magnetic flux generally therebetween. A portable device having a secondary coil can be positioned proximate this region of magnetic flux to receive wireless power from the contactless power supply. The spaced-apart primary coils can be wound in alternating directions about a common axis and driven in phase, or can be wound in a single direction about a common axis and driven approximately 180 degrees out of phase. The contactless power supply can include a plurality of primary coils in an adjustable array to accommodate multiple portable devices each with different secondary configurations and power consumption needs. |
| US09520225B2 |
Apparatus, a system and a method for enabling electromagnetic energy transfer
The apparatus 10 for electromagnetic energy transfer comprises a charging fixture 1 with a contact surface 4 and a generator coil 2 forming a resonator circuit with a capacitance. The charging fixture 1 is preferably arranged as an elongated bar whereon a plurality of chargeable electronic devices 5 can be arranged. In order to implement electromagnetic energy transfer from the charging fixture 1 to the electronic device 5 the latter has to be arranged with a pick-up circuit for generating secondary alternating current in a loop, preferably a secondary resonator circuit. In order to fix a position of the electronic device 5 on the charging bar 1, the charging bar is preferably arranged with a projection 3 extending in a plane of the contact surface 4. The electronic device 5 can be shaped to be hanged on the projection and removed from it in accordance with arrow 6. |
| US09520221B2 |
Method for function monitoring and/or control of a cooling system, and a corresponding cooling system
Exemplary embodiments relate to a system and method for monitoring functional operational reliability of a cooling system having at least one thermosyphon for transformers provided with at least one evaporator and with at least one condenser. The cooling system using a coolant which can be vaporized and a gaseous medium, as a heat carrier. |
| US09520219B2 |
Retention member for perforating guns
A perforating gun includes a charge tube having shaped charges affixed thereto. Each shaped charge includes a radially outward pointing post adapted to receive a detonator cord. A retention member installed on the post provides a compressive force that energetically couples the detonator cord to the post. The radially outermost portion of the retention member is radially flush with or radially recessed relative to the radially outermost portion of each post. In one embodiment, the retention member has a rounded medial portion, a central opening and a pair of locking tabs that point radially inward to the central opening. Each post may include a slot for receiving the detonator cord and a circumferential groove that is adapted to receive the locking tabs. |
| US09520216B2 |
R-T-B based sintered magnet
An R-T-B based magnet as raw material undergoes heating treatment for a long time and main phase grains turn core-shell like. The R-T-B based magnet includes main phase grains having core and shell portions that covers the core. When the mass concentration of R1 and Y in the core portion is set as αR1 and αY respectively and the mass concentration of R1 and Y in the shell portion is set as βR1 and βY respectively, the ratio (B/A) between the mass concentration ratio of R1 to Y in the shell portion (βR1/βY=B) and the mass concentration ratio of R1 to Y in the core portion (αR1/αY=A) is 1.1 or more. Thus, the decrease of coercivity caused by Y addition is prevented, and the increase effect of temperature characteristics caused by addition of Y will lead to improve the magnetic properties under high temperature. |
| US09520214B2 |
Electrical wire holder
There is provided an electric wire holder for holding electric wires connected to terminal fittings at end portions of the wires, the holder configured to attach to a shielding pipe to cover an edge of the shielding pipe into which the electric wires are inserted and from which the terminal fittings and a portion of the electric wires are drawn out to an outside of the shielding pipe, the holder comprising: a first holding piece configured to hold the portion of the electric wires that is drawn out from the shielding pipe and to fix a draw-out position of the terminal fittings. |
| US09520213B2 |
Materials and methods for insulation of conducting fibres, and insulated products
An electrical conductor which has an electrically conducting fiber including carbon nanotubes and/or a graphene nanoribbon and a layer of insulating material coated around the electrically conducting fiber. The insulating material substantially does not penetrate the electrically conducting fiber, or penetrates the electrically conducting fiber only to a depth that leaves a continuous conductive path along a remaining part of the electrically conducting fiber. |
| US09520211B2 |
Method of forming upper electrode of nanowire array
Provided are a method of forming an upper electrode of a nanowire array and a nanowire array having an upper electrode formed thereon. The method includes a step of placing a polymeric thin film layer, a step of pressing, a step of treating a mixed solution, a step of etching, and a step of depositing an electrode material, such that the upper electrode is reliably formed in a state in which the polymeric thin film layer is formed on a portion of the nanowire, thereby making it possible to implement various nano-devices based on the nanowire array aligned on a substrate having a large area. |
| US09520209B2 |
Flame retardant twin axial cable
A cable includes a plurality of conductor sets. Each conductor set extending along a length of the cable and includes two or more insulated conductors, each insulated conductor including a central conductor surrounded by a dielectric material that includes polyolefin, a brominated flame retardant, and antimony trioxide. First and second conductive shielding films are disposed on opposite first and second sides of the conductor set, including cover portions and pinched portions arranged such that, in transverse cross section, the cover portions of the first and second shielding films in combination substantially surround the conductor set, and the pinched portions of the first and second shielding films in combination form pinched portions of the conductor set on each side of the conductor set. The cable includes an adhesive layer bonding the first shielding film to the second shielding film in the pinched portions of the conductor set. |
| US09520205B2 |
Copper containing particle and method for manufacturing same
The present invention relates to a copper containing particle with a surface layer for preventing oxidation and a method for manufacturing the same, and provides a copper containing particle including: a core containing a copper component; a shell formed on the surface of the core, containing a silver component, and having at least one pore; and a filler part configured to fill the pore of the shell and contain an antioxidant component. |
| US09520200B2 |
Method and device for temperature-based data refresh in non-volatile memories
The invention relates to a method comprising measuring the temperature of at least one location of a non-volatile memory; determining if said temperature measurement indicates that the data retention time of data stored at said at least one location is reduced below a threshold; and re-writing said data to said non-volatile memory in a response to a positive determination. |
| US09520197B2 |
Adaptive erase of a storage device
The various implementations described herein include systems, methods and/or devices used to enable adaptive erasure in a storage device. The method includes performing a plurality of memory operations including read operations and respective erase operations on portions of one or more non-volatile memory devices specified by the read operations and respective erase operations, where the respective erase operations are performed using a first set of erase parameters that has been established as a current set of erase parameters prior to performing the respective erase operations. The method includes, in accordance with each erase operation of at least a subset of the respective erase operations, updating one or more erase statistics that correspond to performance of multiple erase operations. The method includes, in accordance with a comparison of the erase statistics with an erasure performance threshold, establishing a second set of erase parameters as the current set of erase parameters. |
| US09520194B2 |
Pre-computation based ternary content addressable memory
A pre-computation based TCAM configured to reduce the number of match lines being pre-charged during a search operation to save power is disclosed. The pre-computation based TCAM stores additional information in a secondary TCAM that can be used to determine which match lines in a primary TCAM storing data words to be searched need not be pre-charged because they are associated with data words guaranteed to not match. The additional information stored in secondary TCAM can include a pre-computation word that represents a range inclusive of a lower and upper bound of a number of ones or zeroes possible in a corresponding data word stored in the primary TCAM. |
| US09520193B2 |
Hierarchical immutable content-addressable memory processor
Improved memory management is provided according to a Hierarchical Immutable Content Addressable Memory Processor (HICAMP) architecture. In HICAMP, physical memory is organized as two or more physical memory blocks, each physical memory block having a fixed storage capacity. An indication of which of the physical memory blocks is active at any point in time is provided. A memory controller provides a non-duplicating write capability, where data to be written to the physical memory is compared to contents of all active physical memory blocks at the time of writing, to ensure that no two active memory blocks have the same data after completion of the non-duplicating write. |
| US09520190B2 |
Modified reset state for enhanced read margin of phase change memory
Subject matter disclosed herein relates to techniques involving a structural relaxation (SR) phenomenon for increasing resistance of a Reset state of phase change memory. |
| US09520187B2 |
Electric device having wire contacts coupled to stack structures with variable resistance elements
This patent document relates to memory circuits or devices and their applications in electronic devices or systems. The disclosed technology in this patent document includes memory circuits or devices and their applications in electronic devices or systems and various implementations of an electronic device in which an electronic device capable of reducing an area, improving device characteristics due to a reduction in the resistance of a switching transistor, simplifying the process, and reducing a cost is provided. In accordance with the electronic device of this patent document, an area can be reduced, device characteristics can be improved due to a reduction in the resistance of the switching transistor, the process can be simplified, and a cost can be reduced. |
| US09520182B2 |
Memory elements with relay devices
Integrated circuits with memory elements are provided. An integrated circuit may include logic circuitry formed in a first portion having complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) devices and may include at least a portion of the memory elements and associated memory circuitry formed in a second portion having nano-electromechanical (NEM) relay devices. The NEM and CMOS devices may be interconnected through vias in a dielectric stack. Devices in the first and second portions may receive respective power supply voltages. In one suitable arrangement, the memory elements may include two relay switches that provide nonvolatile storage characteristics and soft error upset (SEU) immunity. In another suitable arrangement, the memory elements may include first and second cross-coupled inverting circuits. The first inverting circuit may include relay switches, whereas the second inverting circuit includes only CMOS transistors. Memory elements configured in this way may be used to provide volatile storage characteristics and SEU immunity. |
| US09520176B2 |
Semiconductor memory device including power supply line
A semiconductor apparatus disclosed in this disclosure includes a first channel formed in a first area and including a first power supply pad, a first clock pad, a first command address pad, a first data input/output pad and a first memory cell array; a second channel formed in a second area and including a second power supply pad, a second clock pad, a second command address pad, a second data input/output pad and a second memory cell array, the first and second channels being independently controllable from each other; and mesh structure lines straddling the first area and second area and connected to the first and second power supply pads. |
| US09520175B2 |
Magnetization controlling element using magnetoelectric effect
A magnetization controlling element includes a ferromagnetic material layer, an exchange coupling adjustment layer, an antiferromagnetic material layer, an electrode layer, a magnetic field applying mechanism which applies a magnetic field to the antiferromagnetic material layer, and an electric field applying mechanism which applies an electric field to the antiferromagnetic material layer. The antiferromagnetic material layer contains an antiferromagnetic material or ferrimagnetic material having a magnetoelectric effect, the ferromagnetic material layer includes a perpendicular magnetization film having a magnetization component perpendicular to the film surface, the ferromagnetic material layer includes a ferromagnetic material layer that is magnetically connected, through exchange coupling, to the antiferromagnetic material layer. The exchange coupling adjustment layer has a function of adjusting exchange coupling between the ferromagnetic material layer and the antiferromagnetic material layer. |
| US09520174B2 |
Method and apparatus for writing to a magnetic tunnel junction (MTJ) by applying incrementally increasing voltage level
A method of writing to magnetic tunnel junctions (MTJs) of a magnetic memory array includes storing in-coming data in a cache register, reading the present logic state of a first one of a set of at least two MTJs, the set of at least two MTJs including the first MTJ and a second MTJ. The in-coming data is to be written into the second MTJ. Further steps are storing the read logic state into a data register, swapping the contents of the data register and the cache register so that the cache register stores the read logic state and the data register stores the in-coming data, applying a first predetermined voltage level to the set of MTJs thereby causing the first MTJ to be over-written, applying a second predetermined voltage level to the set of MTJs, and storing the in-coming data into the second MTJ. |
| US09520169B2 |
Semiconductor device
One semiconductor device includes a clock signal buffer circuit which, in response to activation of a chip selection signal (CS_n), starts generation of an internal clock signal PCLKAR, and internal circuits which operate in synchronization with the internal clock signal PCLKAR. The clock signal buffer circuit suspends generation of the internal clock signal PCLKAR at a second timing if command signals (CA0 to CA9) indicate read commands, and suspends generation of the internal clock signal PCLKAR at a first timing which is earlier than the second timing if the command signals (CA0 to CA9) indicate active commands. According to one embodiment, an internal clock signal is generated only for periods necessary in accordance with external command signals. |
| US09520163B2 |
Regulator circuit and semiconductor memory apparatus having the same
A regulator circuit may include a comparison unit configured to compare a reference voltage with a feedback voltage and generate a first switching signal. The regulator circuit may include a current supply unit configured to receive a pumping voltage, and determine a level of a second switching signal in response to the first switching signal. The regulator circuit may include an output driver configured to control the level of the second switching signal in response to an output voltage, receive the pumping voltage, and generate the output voltage in response to the second switching signal. The regulator circuit may include a feedback signal generation unit configured to detect a level of the output voltage and generate the feedback voltage. |
| US09520157B2 |
Storage modes for measurement values and contextual information
In one aspect, a portable handheld measurement device automatically stores measurement values in volatile memory in a limited replay storage mode that comprises a storage limitation that applies to the plurality of measurement values stored in the limited replay storage mode; receives a replay request; and, responsive to the replay request, presents at least some of the measurement values stored in the limited replay storage mode. In another aspect, a portable handheld measurement device automatically stores measurement values and associated contextual data according to a persistent storage mode; and automatically stores the measurement values according to a limited replay storage mode, wherein the limited replay storage mode comprises a storage limitation that is not present in the persistent storage mode. |
| US09520153B2 |
Apparatus with disc separator plates
Certain exemplary aspects of the present disclosure are directed towards an apparatus including a base deck, a plurality of storage mediums (e.g., discs) and a plurality of disc separator plates. The base deck includes a sidewall forming a cavity to house the storage medium, with slots in the sidewall in which each disc separator plate extends. The disc separator plates extend into spaces between peripheral ends of adjacent ones of the storage medium. This arrangement can be used to provide rigid coupling of the separator plates, which can mitigate issues relating to vibration or shock. Further, air flow can be mitigated in this regard, such as to reduce effects upon a magnetoresistive transducer that reads data from the storage mediums. |
| US09520151B2 |
Multiple layer FePt structure
A method involves depositing a seed layer comprising at least A1 phase FePt. A main layer of A1 phase FePt is deposited over the seed layer. The main layer includes FePt of a different stoichiometry than the seed layer. The seed and main layers are annealed to convert the A1 phase FePt to L10 phase FePt. The annealing involves heating the substrate prior to depositing at least part of the A1 phase FePt of the main or seed layers. |
| US09520150B2 |
Flexible package and method of making same
A flexible package being capable and being adapted for accommodating a multiplicity of absorbent articles. The package has a substantially parallelepiped-shape and further comprises a frame. The frame is completely surrounding the top gusset extending upwardly and substantially orthogonally from the top gusset. The flexible package also comprises a handle extending over the top gusset. It is a further object of the present invention to provide a method of manufacturing a flexible package. |
| US09520147B2 |
Side shielded magnetoresistive (MR) read head with perpendicular magnetic free layer
A MR sensor is disclosed that has a free layer (FL) with perpendicular magnetic anisotropy (PMA) which eliminates the need for an adjacent hard bias structure to stabilize free layer magnetization and minimizes shield-FL interactions. In a TMR embodiment, a seed layer, free layer, junction layer, reference layer, and pinning layer are sequentially formed on a bottom shield. After patterning, a conformal insulation layer is formed along the sensor sidewall. Thereafter, a top shield is formed on the insulation layer and includes side shields that are separated from the FL by a narrow read gap. The sensor is scalable to widths <50 nm when PMA is greater than the FL self-demag field. Effective bias field is rather insensitive to sensor aspect ratio which makes tall stripe and narrow width sensors a viable approach for high RA TMR configurations. Sensor sidewalls may extend into the seed layer or bottom shield. |
| US09520143B2 |
Foreign language learning apparatus and method for correcting pronunciation through sentence input
A foreign language learning apparatus and method are provided. The foreign language learning apparatus includes a sentence input unit receiving a first sentence from a user; a linked letter detection unit detecting at least one letter corresponding to at least one linking rule; a linked letter removal unit removing the letter and generating a second sentence by inserting a linking code; a partial waveform generation unit generating one or more partial waveforms using the Text To Speech (TTS) engine; an input waveform generation unit converting a voice corresponding to the first sentence into an input waveform; and a matching degree calculation unit calculating a matching degree and a partial matching degree. This foreign language learning apparatus enables a user to effectively learn pronunciation of a foreign language. |
| US09520142B2 |
Efficient apparatus and method for audio signature generation using recognition history
Audio information is monitored by a user device by generating audio signatures of ambient audio content captured by the user device, receiving conditions of the user device that were present when the ambient audio content for each audio signature was captured, performing audio content recognition on the audio signatures by comparing in a query engine the generated audio signatures to audio signatures previously stored in a database associated with the query engine, identifying generated audio signatures that match audio signatures stored in the database within a threshold confidence level, thereby establishing successful audio content recognition, identifying the conditions of the user device that were present for successful audio content recognition, generating scheduling rules regarding the conditions present during successful audio content recognition and controlling when the user device captures audio content and/or generates audio signatures based on the scheduling rules. |
| US09520132B2 |
Voice recognition device and voice recognition method
The voice recognition device according to the present disclosure includes a communication interface that communicates with an external device, a first microphone that collects sound to produce audio data, and a controller that analyzes the audio data produced by the first microphone, determines contents of a designation corresponding to an analysis result, and then controls its own device based on a determination result, and yet controls its own device to urge a user to use the external device when the contents of the designation corresponding to the analysis result cannot be determined. |
| US09520130B2 |
Providing pre-computed hotword models
Methods, systems, and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on a computer storage medium, for obtaining, for each of multiple words or sub-words, audio data corresponding to multiple users speaking the word or sub-word; training, for each of the multiple words or sub-words, a pre-computed hotword model for the word or sub-word based on the audio data for the word or sub-word; receiving a candidate hotword from a computing device; identifying one or more pre-computed hotword models that correspond to the candidate hotword; and providing the identified, pre-computed hotword models to the computing device. |
| US09520128B2 |
Frame skipping with extrapolation and outputs on demand neural network for automatic speech recognition
Techniques related to implementing neural networks for speech recognition systems are discussed. Such techniques may include implementing frame skipping with approximated skip frames and/or distances on demand such that only those outputs needed by a speech decoder are provided via the neural network or approximation techniques. |
| US09520127B2 |
Shared hidden layer combination for speech recognition systems
Providing a framework for merging automatic speech recognition (ASR) systems having a shared deep neural network (DNN) feature transformation is provided. A received utterance may be evaluated to generate a DNN-derived feature from the top hidden layer of a DNN. The top hidden layer output may then be utilized to generate a network including a bottleneck layer and an output layer. Weights representing a feature dimension reduction may then be extracted between the top hidden layer and the bottleneck layer. Scores may then be generated and combined to merge the ASR systems which share the DNN feature transformation. |
| US09520124B2 |
Discriminative training of document transcription system
A system is provided for training an acoustic model for use in speech recognition. In particular, such a system may be used to perform training based on a spoken audio stream and a non-literal transcript of the spoken audio stream. Such a system may identify text in the non-literal transcript which represents concepts having multiple spoken forms. The system may attempt to identify the actual spoken form in the audio stream which produced the corresponding text in the non-literal transcript, and thereby produce a revised transcript which more accurately represents the spoken audio stream. The revised, and more accurate, transcript may be used to train the acoustic model using discriminative training techniques, thereby producing a better acoustic model than that which would be produced using conventional techniques, which perform training based directly on the original non-literal transcript. |
| US09520120B2 |
Generating a control signal based on propagated data
A system for generating a control signal comprises a data propagator (9) for propagating acoustic sensor array data relating to a set of acoustic measurements at a set of sensor positions covering an aperture towards a set of propagated positions to obtain propagated data relating to the set of propagated positions. A control signal generator (2) is arranged for generating a control signal based on the propagated data. The control signal generator (2) comprises a data analyzer (1) for analyzing the propagated data in a spatial frequency domain. The data propagator (9) is arranged for propagating the sensor array data in real-time and the control signal generator (2) is arranged for generating the control signal in real-time. |
| US09520119B2 |
High frequency ultrasonic transducer and matching layer comprising cyanoacrylate
In one aspect, matching layers for an ultrasonic transducer stack having a matching layer comprising a matrix material loaded with a plurality of micron-sized and nano-sized particles. In another aspect, the matrix material is loaded with a plurality of heavy and light particles. In another aspect, an ultrasound transducer stack comprises a piezoelectric layer and at least one matching layer. In one aspect, the matching layer comprises a composite material comprising a matrix material loaded with a plurality of micron-sized and nano-sized particles. In a further aspect, the composite material can also comprise a matrix material loaded with a plurality of heavy and light particles. In a further aspect, a matching layer can also comprise cyanoacrylate. |
| US09520118B2 |
Adjustable support for control devices for electronic musical instruments and similar
The support comprises a board provided with multiple grooves on the upper face thereof, along which attachment brackets can be fitted for the movable control devices, pedals and similar devices on the board, allowing the different control devices to be attached by previously fixing the brackets on the grooves of the board at the required places and the subsequent fixed positioning of the control devices and pedals on the brackets, by means of attachment elements thereof. The grooves of the board have flanges along the upper edges thereof for holding the attachment elements of the brackets. |
| US09520117B2 |
Optical electronic musical instrument
An optical electronic musical instrument device (“e-instrument”) that is configured to identify colors and output sounds that are associated with the identified color is disclosed. The e-instrument may detect colors using a color sensor and generate a color signal as a result. Additionally, the volume of the sound may be influenced by a motion signal generated by a motion sensor, wherein the lower or higher the motion signal's value corresponds to a lower or higher volume. The color and motion signals may be sent to one or more processors, either local or remote from the e-instrument, that generates or retrieves a sound signal based on the color and motion signals. The sound signal may then be transmitted to a speaker and the speaker outputs the sound signal accordingly. The sound signal may be any instrument, including a sound of a guitar, piano, drum, etc. |
| US09520111B1 |
Musical instrument and method of assembling same
A musical instrument including a tubular body having an internal tube with at least one tone hole disposed in a surface of said internal tube to provide air communication between a region inside the internal tube and a region outside of the internal tube; and a first outer shell member configured for attachment to an outer surface of the internal tube; at least one key member including a tone hole closure portion, an axle portion and a biasing member, the tone hole closure portion being movable relative to the tubular body between at least a closed position in which said tone hole closure portion covers the at least one tone hole disposed in the internal tube, and, an opened position in which said tone hole closure portion does not cover the tone hole disposed in the internal tube; wherein at least one of said axle portion and said biasing member are configured for location in a seating location provided by a seating portion disposed on at least one of the first outer shell member and the outer surface of the internal tube whereby the first outer shell member is configured for attachment to the outer surface of the internal tube so as to secure therebetween at least one of the axle portion and the biasing member in its seating location for operation of the key member. |
| US09520109B1 |
Modular adjustable fretboard apparatus
A modular apparatus and method of varying the playability and tonal characteristics of a stringed instrument such as an acoustic or electric guitar which is commonly provided with a body and a fretboard to the instrument's neck. The modular apparatus includes a longitudinal rail, an accessible fasteners, intermediary spacer blocks and a plurality of adjustable and removable frets. The rail is configured to connect with the neck of the stringed instrument and to provide a base for the frets. The frets are configured to move as needed within apertures within the rail. The frets are also configured to receive and support the instrument's strings. The frets are selectively adjustable relative to the rail by the user to change the tonal and playability characteristics of the instrument. |
| US09520108B1 |
Internal bracing for a guitar
A guitar top includes a sound hole, a neck end that is configured for attachment to a guitar neck with a longitudinal axis, a heel end, a transverse axis normal to the longitudinal axis, and a bottom surface. The bottom surface of the guitar top includes a pair of longitudinal braces that are attached to the surface. The pair of longitudinal braces extend primarily along the longitudinal axis from the heel end toward the neck end and terminate at a point beyond the sound hole toward the neck end. Each of the longitudinal braces is positioned on an opposing side of the sound hole such that a distance between the longitudinal braces exceeds the diameter of the sound hole. |
| US09520107B2 |
Keyboard musical instrument
Provided is a keyboard musical instrument such as an acoustic piano or an electronic piano having an appearance and design similar to an acoustic piano, in which a fall board is made of a resin plate-shaped body, and hollow portions are provided inside the plate-shaped body. In addition, the plate-shaped body includes a plate-shaped resin foamed plate portion, and the hollow portions are made of plural air bubbles contained inside the resin foamed plate portion. |
| US09520091B2 |
Liquid crystal cell and the liquid crystal display with the same
A liquid crystal (LC) cell and the liquid crystal display with the same are disclosed. The LC cell includes a first LC cell and a second LC cell arranged opposite to the first LC cell, wherein the first LC cell is a normally white cell, and the second LC cell is a normally black cell. A display brightness of the second LC cell is white when the display brightness of the first LC cell transforms from white to black. The display brightness of the first LC cell is white when the display brightness of the second LC cell transforms from black to white. By mixing the normally white cell and the normally black cell, the response time is enhanced. In addition, the tracking or blurring effects occurring for the moving objects are efficiently eliminated. |
| US09520090B2 |
Electrowetting display apparatus having low power consumption and method of driving the same
An electrowetting display apparatus includes an electrowetting pixel configured to display an image. The electrowetting pixel includes a polar liquid and a nonpolar liquid arranged between a common electrode and a pixel electrode; and a driving circuit configured to control operations of the electrowetting pixel. The driving circuit includes a memory circuit configured to store an image to be displayed by the electrowetting pixel. The driving circuit is further configured to periodically provide a reset signal to the electrowetting pixel while the electrowetting pixel is displaying the image and provide an image stored in the memory circuit to the electrowetting pixel after the electrowetting pixel cell resets. |
| US09520087B2 |
Organic light emitting display
An organic light emitting display includes a display panel, on which a plurality of pixels each including an organic light emitting diode and a driving thin film transistor (TFT) controlling a current flowing in the organic light emitting diode are disposed, a timing controller configured to modulate input digital video data to compensate for changes in electric characteristic of the driving TFT, and a driving circuit unit configured to changes in electric characteristic of the driving TFT of each of specific pixels of the plurality of pixels in an image display period of each image frame and sequentially apply image display data to remaining pixels except the specific pixels along one direction in the image display period. |
| US09520084B2 |
Image quality compensation device and method for organic light emitting display
An image quality compensation device for an organic light emitting display includes: a memory having first and second update blocks selectively storing first and second period compensation values, which are sequentially updated at regular intervals; and a timing controller that configures the first update block as either the current memory page for data loading or the next memory page for data writing and the second update block as the other one of the two, based on a preset check code, and updates the memory by calculating the second period compensation value with the passage of driving time based on the first period compensation value loaded from the update block configured as the current memory page, writing the second period compensation value to the update block configured as the next memory page, and then erasing the first period compensation value from the update block configured as the current memory page. |
| US09520083B2 |
Organic light emitting display device
An organic light emitting display includes a display panel, a power supply circuit, a voltage detection unit and a voltage compensation unit. The display panel includes a plurality of pixels. The power supply circuit outputs a first power source to the display panel. The voltage detection unit is positioned between the display panel and the power supply circuit, and detects a detection voltage data of the first power source output from the power supply circuit. The voltage compensation unit compares the detection voltage data with a previously stored reference voltage data, and controls the power supply circuit to output the first power source having a voltage level set based on the reference voltage data. |
| US09520081B2 |
Recording device and recording method using the same
A device is provided that includes a subtraction portion that outputs a difference value between a target totalizing value, obtained by accumulating a luminance value of a target pixel up to a current frame, and a reference totalizing value corresponding to a luminance value of a reference pixel, adjacent the target pixel, accumulated up to the current frame; a quantization portion that quantizes the difference value and outputs a quantization value; and a quantization error correction portion that corrects the quantization value at a correction frame selected based on a quantization step of the quantization value and a quantization error of the quantization value. |
| US09520079B2 |
Storage and carriage of green metadata for display adaptation
A method for providing display adaptation metadata (DAM) to a user equipment (UE) at a system level is provided. The method includes configuring DAM for storage in an ISO Base Media File Format (ISOBMFF). The method also includes transmitting the DAM to a UE to control an energy consumption of a presentation on a display of the UE. A method for providing display adaptation metadata (DAM) to a user equipment (UE) at a system level is provided. The method includes configuring DAM for carriage in an MPEG-2 transport system (M2TS). The method also includes transmitting the DAM to a UE to control an energy consumption of a presentation on a display of the UE. |
| US09520075B2 |
Image processing method for display apparatus and image processing apparatus
An image processing method and apparatus using the image processing method are provided. The apparatus comprises a processor configured to scale color values of input image data, thereby simulating the optical characteristics of paper. The simulation takes into consideration varying ambient light conditions around the display to imitate the optical characteristics of physical paper in the same ambient light conditions. |
| US09520067B2 |
Air traffic control assistance system, air traffic control assistance method, and storage medium
Provided is an air traffic control assistance system whereby it is possible to display the reliability of an avoidance recommendation over time in a manner which is easily understood by an air traffic controller. For each combination of link information of an aircraft of interest and link information of an aircraft in the vicinity thereof, a graphic identification unit identifies a graphic which represents a prescribed range which is defined by the aircraft in the vicinity thereof, in a plane which includes a three-dimensional vector which is represented by the link information of the aircraft of interest and which is perpendicular to the x-y plane. When transforming a two-dimensional vector in an x-y plane from one fix of the aircraft of interest to the next fix to align in order along the x-axis, a transform matrix computation unit computes, for each two-dimensional vector, a transform matrix which represents a transform from a plane which contains the two-dimensional vector and is perpendicular to the x-y plane to a plane which is defined by the x-axis and a time axis. A display processing unit transforms the graphic, and displays a line which joins the fix and a point which is determined by the time whereat the aircraft of interest transects the fix, and the transformed graphic. |
| US09520066B2 |
Determining landing sites for aircraft
A routing tool is disclosed. The routing tool is configured to determine a landing site for an aircraft by receiving flight data. The routing tool identifies at least one landing site proximate to a flight path and generates a spanning tree between the landing site and the flight path. According to some embodiments, the landing sites are determined in real-time during flight. Additionally, the landing sites may be determined at the aircraft or at a remote system or device in communication with the aircraft. In some embodiments, the routing tool generates one or more spanning trees before flight. The spanning trees may be based upon a flight plan, and may be stored in a data storage device. Methods and computer readable media are also disclosed. |
| US09520065B2 |
Navigation aid information display device of an aircraft and primary flight display for an aircraft
A navigation aid information display device of an aircraft and primary flight display for an aircraft are disclosed. In one aspect, the navigation aid information display system includes a display screen including at least one first display area configured to display a first altitude scale including graduations, the current altitude of the aircraft on the first scale, and set altitude value. The graduations of the first scale are distributed on an arc of a first disc including a first needle centered in the disc and the first needle is configured to indicate the current altitude on the first scale. The distribution of the graduations on the arc is nonlinear and symmetrical relative to a graduation corresponding to the set altitude value and defines extension graduations decreasing from the set altitude value. |
| US09520064B2 |
Train-of-vehicle travel support device, control system and processor unit
A train-of-vehicle travel support device which enables a train-of-vehicle travel of a plurality of vehicles even on a running road in which no magnetic marker is embedded. The train-of-vehicle travel support device includes a sensor unit obtaining road line shape data of a feature on a road surface, a processor unit obtaining running control data based on comparison of the road line shape data obtained by the sensor unit and reference data which has been previously stored, and an inter-vehicle communication device transmitting wirelessly the running control data obtained by the processor unit to a following vehicle. |
| US09520063B2 |
Parking control apparatus, parking control method and parking control system
The present invention relates to a parking control technology. In particular, the present invention relates to a parking control apparatus, a parking control method, and a parking control system which may search a plurality of parking space around a vehicle and allocate identification information to each of the searched parking spaces. |
| US09520061B2 |
Vehicle driver messaging system and method
A steering wheel system for a vehicle includes a display and a controller. The controller receives vehicle parameters from one or more vehicle sensors as well as geometric or navigability characteristics of the road. The controller generates a prediction of an effect of the vehicle parameters on the vehicle with respect to the geometric or navigability characteristics of the road. The controller sends a signal to the display based on the prediction. The display is configured to display a representation of the prediction based on the signal received from the controller. |
| US09520059B2 |
Method for a deterministic selection of a sensor from a plurality of sensors
Method for a deterministic selection of a sensor from a plurality of sensors, having a control unit and multiple sensors connected to the control unit by means of a three-wire bus, wherein the sensors are connected parallel to one another at a three-wire bus by at least two lines and a protocol frame according to SENT specification is used between the control unit and the sensors for a data exchange, and within the protocol frame a specified sensor is selected from a plurality of sensors by means of a selection signal sent by the control unit, wherein each sensor is associated with an unambiguous number of pulses for the selection of the sensor, and the selection of the sensor is performed by means of the selection signal having a predetermined number of pulses occurring immediately in succession. |
| US09520058B2 |
Systems, methods and apparatus for providing an audio indicator via a remote control
Apparatus, systems and methods are described for outputting audible or visual indicators via a remote control for a controlled device. A remote control queries an associated controlled device for information. The controlled device generates a request for the remote control to activate an audio or visual indicator. The request is integrated with a response to the query that is transmitted to the remote control. The remote control outputs an audio or visual indicator responsive to the request. |
| US09520057B2 |
Wireless remote monitoring of critical facilities
A method, apparatus, and system are provided for monitoring environment parameters of critical facilities. A Remote Area Modular Monitoring (RAMM) apparatus is provided for monitoring environment parameters of critical facilities. The RAMM apparatus includes a battery power supply and a central processor. The RAMM apparatus includes a plurality of sensors monitoring the associated environment parameters and at least one communication module for transmitting one or more monitored environment parameters. The RAMM apparatus is powered by the battery power supply, controlled by the central processor operating a wireless sensor network (WSN) platform when the facility condition is disrupted. The RAMM apparatus includes a housing prepositioned at a strategic location, for example, where a dangerous build-up of contamination and radiation may preclude subsequent manned entrance and surveillance. |
| US09520056B2 |
System and methods for enhanced remote control functionality
A hand-held device has a housing having a top surface and a bottom surface opposite the top surface, at least one transmitter, a first user interface associated with the top surface of the housing having first user interface input elements which, when active, are actuatable to cause the at least one transmitter to transmit communications to an external device, and a second user interface associated with the bottom surface of the housing having second user interface input elements which, when active, are actuatable to cause the at least one transmitter to transmit communications to an external device. The hand-held device is programmed to selectively make one of the first user interface input elements of the first user interface and the second user interface input elements of the second user interface active while making the other of the first user interface input elements of the first user interface and the second user interface input elements of the second user interface inactive. |
| US09520054B2 |
Mobile user interface for smart-home hazard detector configuration
System for displaying hazard events and adjusting hazard detector settings on a mobile device includes a user interface executed on the mobile device, a hazard detector, and a computer server system communicatively coupled to the mobile device and hazard detector. The hazard detector generates hazard events indicating detection of smoke or carbon monoxide. The hazard events are transmitted to the computer server system and then to the mobile device. User interface displays the hazard events in an event group. User interface receives an adjusted value for a setting of the hazard detector and transmits the adjusted value to the computer server system. The computer server system determines that the adjusted value corresponds to the hazard detector, receives a check-in event from the hazard detector, and transmits the adjusted value to the hazard detector in response to receiving the check-in event. The hazard detector applies the adjusted value to the setting. |
| US09520053B2 |
Event communication apparatus and method
A method and apparatus is described for transmitting event codes from a base station to a remote location. In one embodiment, a method is described, executed by a processor within an event communication module, the method comprising receiving an encoded event code from a base station over an interface connection, selecting a first transmission method from two or more communication methods based on the received event code, encoding the event code based on the first communication method, and transmitting the encoded event code to remote location by a communication module configured to communicate using the first communication method. |
| US09520050B2 |
Interchangeable personal security device with a communication accessory
An apparatus for personal security is disclosed that includes a portable accessory formed to receive an alerting device. The alerting device fits within a compartment of the portable accessory, and the portable accessory includes a communication device. The apparatus includes an alerting device with an alerting element. The alerting device is interchangeable with a plurality of portable accessories. One or more activation elements are disposed on the portable accessory and formed to activate the alerting device wherein the alerting element sends an alert signal to the communication device in response to receiving an activation signal from the one or more activation elements. In one embodiment, the alerting device sends the alert signal to the communication device in response to receiving the activation signal. In another embodiment, the communication device notifies one or more predefined contacts that an alert signal was sent in response to receiving the alert signal. |
| US09520046B2 |
Refuse removal reminders
According to at least one embodiment, a computer-implemented method to communicate refuse reminders to a user of an automation system is disclosed. A proximity of at least one refuse bin to a base station may be detected at a predetermined time period prior to the refuse removal day using one or more sensors. The user may be alerted to move the at least one refuse bin to a removal location based at least in part on the detecting. In some embodiments, the refuse removal scheduled may be linked with the automation system, wherein the refuse removal schedule may comprise a schedule of refuse pick-up days for a first category of refuse. |
| US09520043B1 |
Identifying an outlet of a power distribution unit based on a power rating of an electronic device
A system includes an electronic device including a baseboard management controller (BMC), a power supply unit (PSU), and an external connector, wherein the BMC controls a serial communication bus, and the external connector includes AC voltage contacts and serial communication bus contacts. A power distribution unit (PDU) includes multiple outlets, a management entity, a radio frequency identification (RFID) tag reader, and a visual indicator. A power cable includes a first plug end for coupling to the external connector, a second plug end for coupling to one of the outlets, AC voltage wires extending end-to-end, a read/write RFID tag in the second plug end, and communication wires extending from the first plug end to the read/write RFID tag. Coupling the first plug end to the external connector connects the AC voltage and connects the serial communication bus such that the BMC is in serial communication with the read/write RFID tag. |
| US09520041B2 |
Monitoring intrusion in an area using WIFI-enabled devices
For monitoring an area, signal strength samples are obtained (S1) by sampling a data signal transmitted from at least one first device and received by at least one second device, and measuring a signal strength of the sampled data signal. The signal strength samples are processed (S2) by forming consecutive first groups of N consecutive signal strength samples, calculating first standard deviations for each of the consecutive first groups, forming consecutive second groups of N consecutive first standard deviations, and calculating second standard deviations for each of the consecutive second groups. Based on the second standard deviations, it is detected (S3) if a fluctuation in the data signal received by the second device has occurred that represents an intrusion in the area. |
| US09520040B2 |
System and method for real-time 3-D object tracking and alerting via networked sensors
The invention is an integrated system consisting of a network of two-dimensional sensors (such as cameras) and processors along with target detection, data fusion, tracking, and alerting algorithms to provide three-dimensional, real-time, high accuracy target tracks and alerts in a wide area of interest. The system uses both target kinematics (motion) and features (e.g., size, shape, color, behavior, etc.) to detect, track, display, and alert users to potential objects of interest. |
| US09520037B2 |
Tactile feedback in an electronic device
An electronic device for providing tactile feedback is provided. The electronic device may provide tactile feedback using any suitable approach, including for example vibration, heat, electrical, visual, or any other type of feedback. The electronic device may provide tactile feedback in response to detecting any particular status of the electronic device, receiving any particular input, or detecting any suitable communication received by the electronic device. For example, the electronic device may provide tactile feedback in response to identifying the current network of the device, the status of a particular electronic device component, or any other electronic device status. As another example, the electronic device may provide tactile feedback in response to receiving a particular type of communication, or in response to receiving a communication from a particular contact. As still another example, the electronic device may provide tactile feedback in response to receiving a particular user input, or to detecting a user's finger on a particular portion of the electronic device. |
| US09520036B1 |
Haptic output generation with dynamic feedback control
A device includes a haptic actuator to generate mechanical force stimuli in accordance with a triggering event. A haptic control system includes an accelerometer to measure the haptic response of the device. Signaling from the accelerometer is analyzed in view of an intended haptic response. A control signal may be modified in view of the analysis to correct out-of-tolerance conditions of the haptic response. This correction may occur in real time or near-real time. Component aging, shifting device performance, or other factors may be compensated for and user expectations satisfied accordingly. |
| US09520025B2 |
Gaming system
A gaming system is provided enabling real-time cash management to be performed, even while in the play of a game to be performed by employing game media rendering their items of recorded information readable. Having received a result of detection of game chips on a game betting board from a game betting device, a server device accumulates the result of the detection, and judges whether or not movement of game chips has occurred between a dealer and each player, in comparison with a past result. When movement of game chips has occurred between the dealer and such each player, data relevant to a game chip table, a player table, and a dealer table is updated so as to reflect a result of the movement. |
| US09520024B2 |
Wagering game award system
A method of operating a wagering game network the supports a plurality of award types. The method may include: detecting a player identifier associated with an award account; detecting, via at least one electronic input device, a physical item associated with a monetary value that establishes a credit balance; initiating the casino wagering game in response to an input indicating a wager covered by the credit balance; displaying, on an electronic display device, a result for the casino wagering game; presenting, on the electronic display device, an indication that awards of a first award type have been awarded to the award account based on the result; detecting, via at least one of the electronic input devices, a request to exchange some of the awards of the first award type for awards of a second award type, and wherein the awards of the second award type are exchangeable within the wagering game network for other awards of the plurality of award types; and submitting the request over a communications network. |
| US09520020B2 |
Managed on-line poker tournaments
A method in a gaming system is described herein. The gaming system includes at least one server having a memory, a network interface, and a processor. The method includes generating a plurality of games. The method further includes determining whether a game is available for play at a first gaming device, including: (a) selecting a first game from the plurality of games, (b) selecting a second gaming device currently granted access to the first game, (c) determining first location information associated with the first gaming device and second location information associated with the second gaming device, (d) determining whether the first game is available for play at the first gaming device, and (e) repeating b), c) and d), for a first group of gaming devices. The method includes sending a message to the first gaming device including information regarding the games available for play at the first gaming device. |
| US09520015B2 |
Systems and methods for playing a game of chance with bonus feature
Systems and methods enable one or more players to play a game of chance. A system includes a processor and a memory device configured to store processor executable instructions to provide a game of chance in which a plurality of house indicia is selected from a pool of house indicia and in which one or more player indicia is provided. The processor is programmed by the instructions to randomly select a predetermined number of house indicia from the pool of house indicia, provide a random chance of selecting a bonus indicia, determine whether a winning number of matching indicia has been achieved by identifying each player indicia that matches one of the selected predetermined number of house indicia, and present a bonus to the player upon a determination that the bonus indicia matches a player indicia and that a winning number of matching indicia has been achieved. |
| US09520014B1 |
Synchronizing soundtracks across wagering game machines
A wagering game system and its operations are described herein. In embodiments, the operations can include detecting a trigger associated with a first wagering game machine. The trigger can be related to wagering game content or a wagering game event. A soundtrack is associated with the wagering game content or wagering game event. The operations can further include beginning play of the soundtrack in unison on the first wagering game machine at an audible volume level and on the second wagering game machine at an inaudible volume level in response to detecting the trigger. |
| US09520012B2 |
Retail location robotic wall system and mobile retail sales vehicle
A robotic retail wall is presented allowing for the dispensing of merchandise within a retail location. The robotic wall includes commodity products and robotics that pick and deliver products to consumers in response to input at a kiosk. The robotics and products are separated from a retail space by a transparent barrier, allowing consumers in the retail space to view the actions of the robotics in retrieving a product. Behind the robotic wall is a product stocking area, where commodity products can be added to the robotic wall with assistance from the robotics. |
| US09520011B2 |
Method and device for detecting and controlling self-service terminal cash dispensing quality
A method and a device for detecting and controlling banknote dispensing quality in a self-service terminal are provided. The method includes: detecting an empty box in the self-service terminal, setting a qualified rate of dispensed banknotes of the empty box as 0, and permanently shielding the empty box; detecting a banknote jammed cashbox in the self-service terminal, setting a qualified rate of dispensed banknotes of the banknote-jammed cashbox as 0, and permanently shielding the banknote-jammed cashbox; detecting qualified rates of dispensed banknotes of all non-empty cashboxes and non-banknote-jammed cashboxes, classifying all the non-empty and non-banknote-jammed cashboxes according to nominal values, and sequencing the cashboxes per nominal value in a descending order of the qualified rates of dispensed banknotes; and maintaining cashboxes ranked top M of the qualified rates of dispensed banknotes per nominal value in an open state, and maintaining the other cashboxes in a temporarily shielded state. |
| US09520006B1 |
Vehicle diagnostics
Computing systems for vehicle diagnostics are provided. In accordance with some aspects, a computing system may include a vehicle having a plurality of sensors for monitoring an operation of one or more vehicle systems. The system may also include a computing device configured to receive, from a vehicle (e.g., from the plurality of sensors monitoring the operation of one or more vehicle systems via a communication interface), at least one signal corresponding to a status of a vehicle component. The computing system may predict, based on the at least one signal, when an issue with the vehicle is likely to occur and may determine, based on the issue, a remedial action for addressing the issue and a timeframe for performing the remedial action. The computing system may store data identifying the issue, the remedial action, and the timeframe in a record associated with the vehicle. |
| US09520005B2 |
Wireless vehicle-monitoring system
Embodiments of the present invention provide a wireless appliance for monitoring a vehicle. The wireless appliance includes a microprocessor configured to select a vehicle-communication protocol of a host vehicle, and then communicate with the host vehicle through the vehicle-communication protocol. The appliance also includes a vehicle-communication circuit, in electrical communication with the microprocessor, which collects diagnostic data from the host vehicle using the vehicle-communication protocol. A GPS module, also in electrical communication with the microprocessor, generates location-based data. For transmitting these data, the appliance includes a first wireless transmitter operating on a terrestrial network and a second wireless transmitter operating on a satellite network. The microprocessor selects the first or second wireless transmitter for transmitting the diagnostic and location-based data. |
| US09520002B1 |
Virtual place-located anchor
A method is disclosed that may include, in a creating phase: receiving an instruction to generate a virtual place-located anchor at a virtual location that is world-locked; receiving data items from a target data source; linking a subset of the data items to the virtual place-located anchor; and receiving a permission from a first user specifying a condition under which a second user may view one or more holograms of the subset of data items. In a viewing phase, first display data may be transmitted to cause a first display device to display the holograms to the first user at the virtual place-located anchor; and if the condition is satisfied, second display data may be transmitted to cause a second display device to display the holograms to the second user at the virtual place-located anchor. |
| US09519990B2 |
Image display apparatus
The invention relates to an image display apparatus for displaying an image like a three-dimensional medical image of an object. A template providing unit (3) provides a template defining display parameters for displaying the image based on anatomical features of the object, and an anatomical feature detecting unit (4) detects an anatomical feature in the image. A display parameter determining unit (5) determines a display parameter defining, for example, a desired view, based on the detected anatomical feature and the template, and a display unit (8) displays the image by displaying, for example, the desired view, in accordance with the determined display parameter. This allows the image display apparatus to show the image on the display in a desired usual way as defined by the template, even if in the originally provided image the object is shown in an unusual way. |
| US09519989B2 |
Visual representation expression based on player expression
Using facial recognition and gesture/body posture recognition techniques, a system can naturally convey the emotions and attitudes of a user via the user's visual representation. Techniques may comprise customizing a visual representation of a user based on detectable characteristics, deducting a user's temperament from the detectable characteristics, and applying attributes indicative of the temperament to the visual representation in real time. Techniques may also comprise processing changes to the user's characteristics in the physical space and updating the visual representation in real time. For example, the system may track a user's facial expressions and body movements to identify a temperament and then apply attributes indicative of that temperament to the visual representation. Thus, a visual representation of a user, which may be, for example, an avatar or fanciful character, can reflect the user's expressions and moods in real time. |
| US09519985B2 |
Generating mobile-friendly animations
Systems and methods are disclosed for generating mobile-friendly animations. In one implementation, a processing device receives a first animation in a first format, the first animation including one or more of graphical components. The processing device processes the first animation to identify, with respect to the first animation, one or more animation instructions. The processing device generates, based on the first animation and the one or more animation instructions, a second animation in a second format, the second animation including (a) one or more components that correspond to the plurality of graphical components and (b) one or more animation instructions. |
| US09519983B2 |
Image processing device, image processing method and program
According to an illustrative embodiment, an image processing device is provided. The image processing device includes a foreground selection processing circuit to select at least one foreground image that has been separated from a source image; a background selection circuit to select at least two display background images from at least one background image that has been separated from the source image; and a combination circuit to combine the at least one selected foreground image with the at least two display background images to generate a plurality of combined images, wherein at least one of the plurality of combined images does not appear in the source image. |
| US09519964B2 |
System and method for generating three-dimensional images from two-dimensional bioluminescence images and visualizing tumor shapes and locations
A system and methods for generating 3D images from 2D bioluminescent images and visualizing tumor locations are provided. A plurality of 2D bioluminescent images of a subject are acquired using any suitable bioluminescent imaging system. The 2D images are registered to align each image and to compensate for differences between adjacent images. After registration, corresponding features are identified between consecutive sets of 2D images. For each corresponding feature identified in each set of 2D images, an orthographic projection model is applied, such that rays are projected through each point in the feature. The intersection points of the rays are plotted in a 3D image space. All of the 2D images are processed in the same manner, such that a resulting 3D image of a tumor is generated. |
| US09519961B2 |
Methods and systems of imaging cut stones
A method of imaging a cut stone. The method comprises a) identifying an orientation of a cut stone (202), b) creating a volumetric model of the cut stone according to the orientation (203), c) capturing a plurality of images of the cut stone from a plurality of viewing angles around the cut stone (204), d) cropping a plurality of segments depicting the cut stone from the plurality of images using the volumetric model (205), and e) generating a volumetric image of the cut stone from the plurality of segments (207,208). |
| US09519960B2 |
Method for estimating a number of objects
A method for estimating a number of objects is to be implemented by a processing module, and is utilized to estimate a number of a plurality of objects having elongated shapes based on an image of the objects that contains substantially-circular end faces of the objects. The method includes steps of generating a characteristic image based on the image of the objects, the characteristic image containing a plurality of characteristic patterns which are associated with the end faces of the objects, calculating a number of the characteristic patterns based on the characteristic image, and obtaining an estimated number of the objects based on at least the number of the characteristic patterns thus calculated. |
| US09519957B1 |
Automated selective application of fill light filter
Aspects of the subject technology relate to automatically and selectively applying a fill light filter to an image. A process includes determining an edge-preserved, smoothed version of the image, and determining a grayscale version of the image. The process also includes comparing each pixel of the edge-preserved, smoothed version of the image to each corresponding pixel of the grayscale version of the image. The process also includes applying the fill light filter to the image based on the comparison. The fill light filter is automatically adjusted based on identifying regions in the image. Selectively applying the fill light filter can reduce artifacts and noise from forming or being amplified as a result of the fill light filter. |
| US09519955B2 |
Method of embedding of an image with a color transform
The method comprises the generation of a deteriorated image associated with a first bit rate and of a deteriorated color transform associated with a second bit rate, an evaluation of a first distortion by comparison of the image with a first test image obtained by the application of the color transform to the deteriorated image, and of a second distortion by comparison of the image with a second test image obtained by the application of the deteriorated color transform to the image, and the determination of a final conjoint bit rate associated with a best trade-off between a conjoint bit rate (R=R1+R2) and a global distortion (dE=dE1+DE2). The optimized deteriorated image and the optimized deteriorated color transform are then embedded based on this conjoint bit rate. |
| US09519951B2 |
Downsampling based display method and apparatus
Downsampling based display method and apparatus are provided. An input image including multiple pixels is obtained. At least two pixels neighboring with a to-be-calculated DS pixel on each of at least two directions from the pixels are obtained to get at least four first neighboring pixels. Theoretical values of each first neighboring pixel on the at least two directions are calculated. Errors of the theoretical values of each first neighboring pixel and a corresponding original value are obtained. Weight coefficients for calculating the DS pixel are determined according to the errors. An estimation value of the DS pixel is calculated according to the weight coefficients and the weighted cubic interpolation calculation model. As to the other DS pixels of target image, corresponding estimation values are calculated using the above steps, and then a downsampling processed image is obtained. The color aliasing is avoided and sharp image is obtained. |
| US09519950B2 |
Image generating apparatus and image generating method
An image generating apparatus includes an imaging device that photographs a user to generate a photographed image, and a control device that performs a process of compositing an image for composition with the photographed image. The control device detects a plurality of parts of a body of the user from the photographed image, adjusts the image for composition in size, position, and direction depending on a size, a position, and a direction of each of the plurality of the detected parts, and composites the image for composition with the photographed image with the adjusted size, at the adjusted position, and in the adjusted direction. |
| US09519948B2 |
Data processing apparatus, data processing method, and non-transitory computer readable medium
A data processing apparatus includes an analyzer and a controller. The analyzer analyzes data in plural regions of target data to thereby determine, for each region, a block size to be applied as a unit of processing of data in the region. The controller configures, for each region, a circuit corresponding to the block size to be applied to the region, in a reconfigurable circuit in a case of processing the data in the plural regions of the target data. |
| US09519946B2 |
Partial tile rendering
In accordance with some embodiments, partial rendering of non-changing or slowly changing frame tiles allows the graphics processing unit to spend less time processing non-changing or slowly changing portions of each frame, saving power and creating more room for performance in some embodiments. |
| US09519945B2 |
Image processing apparatus, control method, and program therefor
A graphic division unit divides image data to be output into a plurality of divided regions, and an order determination unit determines a generation order of a plurality of the divided regions of the image data so as to cause a first generation order of the image data and a second generation order of the image data to be different from each other. A generation stop instruction unit causes generation of the image data until the image data combining the image data generated based on the first generation order with the image data generated based on the second generation order corresponds to the image data to be output. |
| US09519940B1 |
Method and system for recording and using a traveler's travel preferences
A method and system for booking a travel ticket for a traveler. The method includes recording a traveler's travel preferences in online repository for personal information in an account established for the traveler. The stored information is then sent to a second computer along with authorization information to enable booking a ticket for the traveler. |
| US09519939B2 |
Smart switch and smart home system using the same
A smart switch applied to a smart home system is connected to a power supply and at least one electronic device. The smart switch includes a screen, a power detecting unit configured to detect real-time electrical information of the electronic device, a processor unit including a calculating module configured to calculate total electricity consumption of the electronic device and a control module configured to control the screen to display instantaneous electrical information and the total electricity consumption, and a communication unit configured to connect the smart switch to a gateway of the smart home system in wired or wireless manner, and send the electrical information and the total electricity consumption to the gateway. A smart home system is also provided. |
| US09519938B2 |
Mining of user event data to identify users with common interests
A computer-implemented matching service matches users to other users, and/or to user communities, based at least in part on a computer analysis of event data reflective of user behaviors. The event data may, for example, evidence user affinities for particular items represented in an electronic catalog, such as book titles, music titles, movie titles, and/or other types of items that tend to reflect the traits of users. Event data reflective of other types of user actions, such as item-detail-page viewing events, browse node visits, search query submissions, and/or web browsing patterns may additionally or alternatively be considered. By taking such event data into consideration, the matching service reduces the burden on users to explicitly supply personal profile information, and reduces poor results caused by exaggerations and other inaccuracies in such profile information. |
| US09519936B2 |
Method and apparatus for analyzing and applying data related to customer interactions with social media
Embodiments of the invention provide techniques that quantize community interactions with social media to understand and influence consumer experiences. |
| US09519931B2 |
System and method for personalized actionable notifications
Systems and methods of personalized actionable notifications are disclosed. In some example embodiments, event information indicating an event for an item is received, a determination is made to provide a notification of the event to the user based on the event information and user activity information for the user, the notification is generated based on the determination, and the generated notification is caused to be displayed on a screen of the computing device via an application on a computing device of the user without causing the computing device to leave a context of content being displayed on the computing device prior to the notification being displayed on the computing device, the application being independent of the context, the notification overlaying the content, and the notification further comprising at least one user interface element configured to enable the user to request an action to be performed for the item. |
| US09519926B2 |
Buy now option from map view
Product search results may be presented to a user via a map view, with merchants selling a selected product displayed on a map. A buy now button may be displayed for a merchant within the map view, allowing the user to execute a purchase transaction directly from the map view. |
| US09519923B2 |
System for collective network of augmented reality users
Embodiments of the invention provide for using video analysis, such as augmented reality or the like to assist a group of users to utilize mobile devices for creating a collective network environment of users that identifies objects in which one or more users in a group of users may be interested, and notifies the one or more users of information associated with the object. A collective network comprises a group of users that each have a mobile device that contains or is otherwise operatively coupled to a data capture device. For example, the mobile device may be a mobile phone that is capable of taking video with a camera device. A user in the collective network may capture video on his mobile device, and an application can identify the object in the video and provide interested users in the collective network with information about the object. |
| US09519919B2 |
In-store advertisement customization
A system or method is provided to detect and check-in a user at a merchant's store. The system may retrieve the user's preferences and may customize advertisements and/or promotions based on the user's preferences. The customized advertisements may then be presented or displayed to the user as the user browses or shops in the merchant's store. In particular, the customized advertisements may be selected or generated based on the user's transaction history, browsing history, purchase history, pre-defined preferences, and the like. In an embodiment, the system may detect and check-in multiple users at a merchant's location. The system may select or generate advertisements based on multiple users who are visiting the merchant. |
| US09519918B2 |
Image quality assessment to merchandise an item
Image-based features may be significantly correlated with click-through rates of images that depict a product, which may provide a more formal basis for the informal notion that good quality images will result in better click-through rates, as compared to poor quality images. Accordingly, an image assessment machine is configured to analyze image-based features to improve click-through rates for shopping search applications (e.g., a product search engine). Moreover, the image assessment machine may rank search results based on image quality factors and may notify sellers about low quality images. This may have the effect of improving the brand value for an online shopping website and accordingly have a positive long-term impact on the online shopping website. |
| US09519916B2 |
System and method for concurrently conducting cause-and-effect experiments on content effectiveness and adjusting content distribution to optimize business objectives
The present invention is directed to systems, articles, and computer-implemented methods for assessing effectiveness of communication content and optimizing content distribution to enhance business objectives. Embodiments of the present invention are directed to computer-implemented methods for a computer-implemented method, comprising conducting an experiment using experimental content to determine effectiveness of communication content and executing, while conducting the experiment, a machine learning routine (MLR) using MLR content to enhance an effectiveness metric. |
| US09519912B2 |
Hybrid system for demand prediction
In demand prediction, a history of demand for a resource is modeled to generate a baseline model of the demand, and demand for the resource at a prediction time is predicted by evaluating a regression function of depth k operating on an input data set including at least the demand for the resource at the prediction time output by the baseline model and measured demand for the resource measured at k times prior to the prediction time. The resource may be off-street parking, and the input data set may further include weather data. The regression function may comprise a support vector regression (SVR) function that is trained on the history of demand for the resource. The baseline model suitably comprises a Fourier model of the history of demand for the resource. |
| US09519909B2 |
Methods and apparatus to identify users of handheld computing devices
Methods and apparatus to identify users of handheld computing devices are disclosed. An example method includes generating, via a logic circuit, a first handling pattern indicative of a manner in which a handheld computing device is moved while the handheld computing device is presenting media; and storing the first handling pattern and corresponding user identification information in a database, handling patterns stored in the database to identify users of the handheld computing device. |
| US09519904B2 |
NFC/RF mechanism with multiple valid states for detecting an open container, and methods of making and using the same
A wireless (e.g., near field or RF) communication device, and methods of manufacturing and using the same are disclosed. The wireless communication device includes a receiver and/or transmitter, a substrate with an antenna thereon, an integrated circuit, and one or more protection lines. The antenna receives and/or transmits or broadcasts a wireless signal. The integrated circuit processes the wireless signal and/or information therefrom, and/or generates the wireless signal and/or information therefor. The integrated circuit has a first set of terminals electrically connected to the antenna. The protection line(s) are on a common or different substrate as the antenna. The protection line(s) sense or determine a continuity state of a package or container on which the communication device is placed or to which the communication device is fixed or adhered, and are electrically connected to a second set of terminals of the integrated circuit different from the first set of terminals. |
| US09519903B2 |
Method and apparatus for proactive notifications based on the location of a user
The location of a user is obtained and, based on the location of the user and services available to, or requested by the user, a notification handler sends appropriate notifications to the user. |
| US09519902B2 |
Fraud monitoring system with distributed cache
Systems and methods for fraud monitoring in a payment service are disclosed. An exemplary system includes a first server being located at a first locale and routing a first series of transaction requests. The system includes a second server being located at a second locale and routing a second series of transaction requests. The transactions requests may or may not be associated with a single payment service user account. The system includes a distributed cache storing a set of transaction details of the two series of transaction requests. The system includes a risk service having access to the set of transaction details from the distributed cache. The risk service generates a fraud warning based on a result of a comparison of at least one transaction detail in the set of transaction details and at least one transaction detail of a new transaction request received by the first server. |
| US09519900B2 |
Secure two party matching transaction system
The invention relates to a method, and an arrangement (A) for identifying a purchaser (1) and a retailer (2) and per-forming an economical transaction between the purchaser (1) and the retailer (2) at a point of sale (21), where the purchaser (1) has a mobile device (11), and where the point of sale (21) communicates with a transaction system (3). The transaction system (3) transfers funds (31) from the purchaser to the retailer according to given information from the purchaser and the retailer. The inventive method, and arrangement comprise the steps of; the mobile device (11) reading an identity of the point of sale (24) by means of a at least one of a camera, and a radio frequency receiver comprised in the mobile device (11), the mobile device (11), and point of sale generates and transmits messages comprising the identity of the point of sale (24) and the identity of the mobile device (14) through different channels of communication. Furthermore, the invention comprises computer program products conducting the software code needed for the invention to be carried out. |
| US09519896B2 |
Check cashing automated banking machine
An automated banking machine is operated at least in part to data read from data bearing records. The machine is operative to carry out a financial transfer responsive at least in part to a determination that data read through a card reader of the machine corresponds to a financial account that is authorized to conduct a transaction through operation of the machine. The machine also includes a check acceptor operative to receive checks from machine users. The check acceptor is operative image checks and data resolved from check images is used in operation of the machine to cause financial transfers. |
| US09519895B2 |
Gift card association with account
Embodiments of the invention are directed to systems, methods and computer program products for associating gift cards with accounts. An exemplary apparatus is configured to: receive information associated with a gift card; associate the gift card with the account; receive information associated with a transaction; determine the transaction qualifies for the gift card; and apply funds associated with the gift card to the transaction. |
| US09519891B1 |
System and method for recycling non-reusable refrigerant containers
A system and method for recycling non-reusable refrigerant transport containers. At least one intact refrigerant transport container is received into a sealed chamber. The refrigerant transport container is punctured to release residual refrigerant, which is removed and compressed. The container is shredded and/or compacted. A refrigerant transport container deposit program is provided, comprising: encoding a deposit container prior to use; receiving the encoded spent container and releasing the imposed deposit; automatically removing residual refrigerant from the spent container; and recycling materials from the refrigerant transport container. A database storing a record relating to the encoded refrigerant transport containers may be employed for tracking. |
| US09519890B2 |
Display of invitee-posted update information regarding meeting within calendaring-oriented computer program
A calendaring-oriented computer program displays a meeting to which a user of the program has been invited to participate. The program visually indicates that a first other user who has also been invited to participate in the meeting has posted first update information relevant to the meeting and that the user is permitted to view. The program permits the user to post second update information relevant to the meeting and to specify a second other user who has also been invited to participate in the meeting as being permitted to view the second update information. The program permits the user to schedule a time at which the second update information is to be posted. The program permits the user to view the first update information and to post the second update information regardless of whether the user accepts, delegates, or declines, or has accepted, delegated, or declined, the meeting. |
| US09519885B2 |
System and method for linking a web-based resource with an electronic medical record
A data processing system and method that, in some cases, include an EMR system and a web server. In some cases, the EMR system includes a plurality of electronic medical records for a plurality of patients. One or more of the electronic medical records may include a URL or HTTP Post message that defines a path to a web-based resource, such as a treatment algorithm or medical calculator. In some embodiments, the URL and/or HTTP Post message is constructed based on information in a patient's medical record. |
| US09519884B2 |
Data driven dynamic workflow
A method, system and article of manufacture for workflow processing and, more particularly, for managing creation and execution of data driven dynamic workflows. One embodiment provides a computer-implemented method for managing execution of workflow instances. The method comprises providing a parent process template and providing a child process template. The child process template is configured to implement an arbitrary number of workflow operations for a given workflow instance, and the parent process template is configured to instantiate child processes on the basis of the child process template to implement a desired workflow. The method further comprises receiving a workflow configuration and instantiating an instance of the workflow on the basis of the workflow configuration. The instantiating comprises instantiating a parent process on the basis of the parent process template and instantiating, by the parent process template, one or more child processes on the basis of the child process template. |
| US09519880B1 |
Wireless visualization interface for autonomous ground vehicle signal coverage
A system for analyzing the network traffic health of an inventory management system that includes an autonomous vehicle and a plurality of access points. The autonomous vehicle interacts with access points in an inventory management system, and network traffic information related to network connectivity between the autonomous vehicle and the access points is obtained. The autonomous vehicle or the access points transmit(s) the network traffic information to a computer system that can generate a graphical user interface that represents the network traffic information for the inventory management system. The network traffic information can include a variety of information about the interactions between autonomous vehicles and access points, such as roam time of the autonomous vehicles between access points as the autonomous vehicles navigate within the inventory management system. |
| US09519877B2 |
Multi-environment configuration of data integration projects
A system and method for facilitating execution of one or more data integration projects in multiple environments or an environment that undergoes changes. Each project has a set of project parameters, which are bound to environment variables. Each environment has a corresponding environment representation with environment variables and corresponding values. Each project is mapped to an environment representation. Values of environment variables are provided to projects with corresponding parameters. When one or more projects are changed to a different environment with a different corresponding environment representation, the environment variable values of the new environment representation are provided to the projects. When an environment change is reflected in the environment representation, the changed variable values are provided to mapped projects. |
| US09519876B2 |
Method for providing maintenance to an asset
A method for providing maintenance to an asset is disclosed. In one embodiment, a database having asset information from a plurality of disparate sources is accessed. Asset information in the database is utilized to generate an asset report. The asset report is utilized to track an asset including its location and operation. Scheduling information regarding the asset is utilized such that the manufacturer can provide a scheduled/unscheduled maintenance program for the asset. |
| US09519871B1 |
Contextual text adaptation
Contextual adaptation of documents automatically replaces words for synonyms that appear within context or topic whey they are being used. A machine learned topic modeling, trained by a set of documents representative of a target user is executed to determine topics of an input document, and to determine words in the document to replace based on determining the relevance of the words to the topics in the documents. An output document is generated based on the input document with the replaced words. |
| US09519869B2 |
Predictive computer system resource monitoring
A method, system and computer-usable medium are disclosed for monitoring a computer system to predict failed or degraded operational states and respond with an alarm or corrective action. Resource collection and consumption are analyzed to derive velocity and acceleration. A hidden Markov model with the resource collection and consumption data as observation spaces predicts computer system state spaced indicative of a failed or degraded computer system operating state. |
| US09519868B2 |
Semi-supervised random decision forests for machine learning using mahalanobis distance to identify geodesic paths
Semi-supervised random decision forests for machine learning are described, for example, for interactive image segmentation, medical image analysis, and many other applications. In examples, a random decision forest comprising a plurality of hierarchical data structures is trained using both unlabeled and labeled observations. In examples, a training objective is used which seeks to cluster the observations based on the labels and similarity of the observations. In an example, a transducer assigns labels to the unlabeled observations on the basis of the clusters and certainty information. In an example, an inducer forms a generic clustering function by counting examples of class labels at leaves of the trees in the forest. In an example, an active learning module identifies regions in a feature space from which the observations are drawn using the clusters and certainty information; new observations from the identified regions are used to train the random decision forest. |
| US09519866B2 |
Diagnosis support apparatus, method of controlling the same, and storage medium
A diagnosis support apparatus which provides information for supporting medical diagnosis obtains known medical information of a diagnosis target held in a database as “already-input” information, and has a selection unit that selects non-input information to be presented as medical information, other than the already-input information. A similar-case obtaining unit obtains, using the already-input information and the presentation non-input information, a case including the presentation non-input information from a case database, as a case similar to that of the diagnosis target, and a presentation unit presents the presentation non-input information and the similar case. |
| US09519855B2 |
Non-contact IC label and nameplate
A non-contact IC label includes a magnetic sheet, a gap retention member including a dielectric material, and a communication section provided between the magnetic sheet and the gap retention member. The communication section includes an IC chip and a first antenna section and a second antenna section which are connected to the IC chip. The magnetic sheet has a first magnetic face facing the gap retention member, and the IC chip, the first antenna section and the second antenna section are provided on the first magnetic face of the magnetic sheet. |
| US09519850B2 |
Computer-readable recording medium, information processing apparatus, and printing system
In the invention, an information processing apparatus comprises: a document data receiving unit configured to receive document data of a plurality of pages to be printed; a setting information receiving unit configured to receive special duplex printing in which a page layout manner differs on a first side and a second side in setting information used for performing printing; and a print data generating unit configured to produce print data in which the pages are laid out on the first side in a first layout manner and on the second side in a second layout manner different from the first layout manner as the print data for causing a printing apparatus to print the document data received by the document data receiving unit, when the special duplex printing is set in the setting information received by the setting information receiving unit. |
| US09519847B2 |
Traceable labeling apparatus for containers of biological products
An apparatus for identifying a patient and marking containers of biological products or test tubes (13) associated with said patient before collecting said biological products to be analyzed is described, comprising a high security portable hardware device (1) for processing and storing the patient's data capable of associating the patient's personal data and biometric data, a reading and patient biometric recognition device (2) of said portable hardware device, a personal computer (4) interacting with an operator and connected to a local communications network (50) for exchanging information with remote data storage means (3), one or more computerized labeling machines (5) of test tubes (13), each comprising a printer (11) of barcodes onto labels (10) adapted to receive printing commands after comparing expected and detected specimens (13) accommodated in a positioning and recognition device (12) supported by said labeling machine (5) and applying said labels (10) to said test tubes (13). Each of said labeling machines (5) comprises a processing and control board (6) provided with a univocal address within said local communications network (50), which can be recalled by said operator by typing into a browser of said personal computer (4), said processing and control board (6) being capable of exchanging information with said remote data storage means (3) and with said personal computer (4), and on the basis of said information, as well as that received after said comparison operated by said positioning and recognition device (12), of sending said print commands to said printer (11) included in said labeling machine. |
| US09519844B1 |
Infrared thermographic methods for wrinkle characterization in composite structures
Methods for identifying and quantifying wrinkles in a composite structure by processing infrared imaging data. Temperature versus time profiles for all pixels in the field of view of an infrared camera are calculated, enabling thermal signatures to be produced. By comparing the thermal signature of the part under test with the thermal signature of a reference standard representing a similar part having wrinkles of known size and shape, the presence of wrinkles can be detected. The wrinkle wavelength can be determined by measuring the infrared image and applying a transfer function. If the geometric information acquired using infrared thermography does not reach a certain quality factor (for a quality prediction) or is incomplete, an ultrasonic transducer array probe running wrinkle quantification software can be rotated into position and scanned over the wrinkle area. The ultrasonic imaging data can be combined with the infrared imaging data to enable an improved quantification of the wrinkle geometry. |
| US09519841B2 |
Attached matter detector and vehicle equipment control apparatus
An attached matter detector includes a light source configured to irradiate light toward a plate-like transparent member from one surface thereof, an imaging device configured to image reflection light by attached matter on a surface of the plate-like transparent member, a memory configured to previously store flare information obtained by the image device by turning on the light source in a state without having disturbance light and the attached matter on the surface of the plate-like transparent member, and a difference information-obtaining device configured to obtain difference information between a light-up image as an image obtained by the imaging device with the turned-on light source and a light-out image as an image obtained by the imaging device with the turned-off light source, wherein the attached matter on the surface of the plate-like transparent member is detected based on the difference information and the flare information stored in the memory. |
| US09519840B2 |
Cardiovascular OCT image making method and method for detecting stents using thereof
A cardiovascular OCT image making method which reduces artifacts includes the steps of: inputting a cardiovascular OCT image; converting coordinates of the inputted OCT image into two-dimensional polar coordinates (θ and r); generating a brightness control function of the A-line direction based on the blood wall relative to each θ value; forming a brightness image in the A-line direction based on the blood wall depending on the brightness control function; and forming an OCT image of which brightness is controlled by the brightness image by applying the brightness image formed on the inputted OCT image. |
| US09519835B2 |
Efficient biometric authentication using narrowed biometric data
A biometric authentication device includes: a biometric sensor that obtains biometric information; a memory; and a circuitry configured to: select an objective user according to density of a predetermined range including a comparison-use part data that is a part of a comparison-use feature data extracted from the biometric information in a class of a registered part data that is a part of a registered feature data; and perform comparing between a registered feature data of a selected objective user and the comparison-use feature data. |
| US09519833B2 |
Lane detection method and system using photographing unit
A lane detection method includes acquiring an image in front of a vehicle using a photographing unit provided in the vehicle, detecting, from the acquired image, a positive edge (P.E.) in which a right pixel has a higher brightness value than a brightness value of a left pixel, detecting, from the acquired image, a negative edge (N.E.) in which a left pixel has a higher brightness value than a brightness value of a right pixel, generating a first expansion image by expanding a pixel by a length corresponding to a width of a lane on a right side of the positive edge (P.E.), generating a second expansion image by expanding the pixel by the length corresponding to the width of the lane on a left side of the negative edge (N.E.), and detecting the lane by combining the first expansion image and the second expansion image. In addition, a lane detection system includes a photographing unit that is provided in a vehicle to acquire an image in front of the vehicle, an edge detection unit that detects, from the image in front of the vehicle, a positive edge (P.E.) in which a right pixel has a higher brightness value than a brightness value of a left pixel and a negative edge (N.E.) in which a left pixel has a higher brightness value than a brightness value of a right pixel, an edge expansion unit that generates a first expansion image by expanding a pixel by a length corresponding to a width of a lane on a right side of the positive edge (P.E.) and generates a second expansion image by expanding the pixel by the length corresponding to the width of the lane on a left side of the negative edge (N.E.), and a lane detection unit that detects the lane by combining the first expansion image and the second expansion image. |
| US09519829B2 |
Image processing system, information processing apparatus, and recordable medium
An image processing system comprises a generating unit that reads documents and generates a read image including document images; an extracting unit that extracts each of the document images; a character recognizing unit that performs character recognition processing on each the document images; a determining unit that determines whether first information and second information have a pair relationship, the first information being any one of recognition results obtained on one side of the document images, and the second information being any one of recognition results obtained on the other side of the document images; and a registering unit that registers pieces of information for the recognition results corresponding to the one side and to the other side respectively including the first information and the second information which are determined that both pieces of information have the pair relationship, as information for a piece of the documents, in a storage unit. |
| US09519828B2 |
Isolate extraneous motions
A system may receive image data and capture motion with respect to a target in a physical space and recognize a gesture from the captured motion. It may be desirable to isolate aspects of captured motion to differentiate random and extraneous motions. For example, a gesture may comprise motion of a user's right arm, and it may be desirable to isolate the motion of the user's right arm and exclude an interpretation of any other motion. Thus, the isolated aspect may be the focus of the received data for gesture recognition. Alternately, the isolated aspects may be an aspect of the captured motion that is removed from consideration when identifying a gesture from the captured motion. For example, gesture filters may be modified to correspond to the user's natural lean to eliminate the effect the lean has on the registry of a motion with a gesture filter. |
| US09519806B2 |
Domain-specific hardwired web server machine
A domain-specific hardwired symbolic web server machine is described that processes information via the hardwired mapping of symbols from one or more domains onto other such domains, computing and communicating with improved security and reduced power consumption because it has no CPU, no Random Access Memory (RAM), no instruction registers, no Instruction Set Architecture (ISA), no operating system (OS) and no applications programming. The machine provides web services by recognizing legal requests such as HTTP GET request and responding with an HTML web page. In some embodiments, the machine has no unconstrained RAM into which malware may insert itself and needs no anti-virus software. |
| US09519803B2 |
Secure environment for graphics processing units
In accordance with some embodiments, a protected execution environment may be defined for a graphics processing unit. This framework not only protects the workloads from malware running on the graphics processing unit but also protects those workloads from malware running on the central processing unit. In addition, the trust framework may facilitate proof of secure execution by measuring the code and data structures used to execute the workload. If a part of the trusted computing base of this framework or protected execution environment is compromised, that part can be patched remotely and the patching can be proven remotely throughout attestation in some embodiments. |
| US09519801B2 |
Systems, methods, and apparatuses for implementing data masking via compression dictionaries
In accordance with disclosed embodiments, there are provided methods, systems, and apparatuses for implementing data masking via compression dictionaries including, for example, means for receiving customer data at the host organization; compressing the customer data using dictionary based compression and a compression dictionary; storing the compressed customer data in a database of the host organization; retrieving the compressed customer data from the database of the host organization; and de-compressing the compressed customer data via a masked compression dictionary, in which the masked compression dictionary de-compresses the customer data into masked customer data. Other related embodiments are disclosed. |
| US09519798B2 |
Zero-knowledge databases
Provided is a process of operating a zero-knowledge encrypted database, the process including: obtaining a request for data in a database stored by an untrusted computing system, wherein the database is stored in a graph that includes a plurality of connected nodes, each of the nodes including: an identifier, accessible to the untrusted computing system, that distinguishes the respective node from other nodes in the graph; and an encrypted collection of data stored in encrypted form, wherein: the untrusted computing system does not have access to an encryption key to decrypt the collections of data, the encrypted collections of data in at least some of the plurality of nodes each include a plurality of keys indicating subsets of records in the database accessible via other nodes in the graph and corresponding pointers to identifiers of the other nodes. |
| US09519796B1 |
Systems and methods for electronic ticket management
A computer system according to certain aspects uses past ticket usage data indicating a probability that a respective entity would personally use a ticket issued to them based on a history of past ticket usage. A ticket controller can respond to ticket requests by determining whether a ticket should be issued to a requesting entity based on the past ticket usage data associated with the requesting entity's profile, and if so issue a ticket to the requesting entity in electronic form. The system can receive a ticket use notification and update the past ticket usage data associated with the requesting entity's profile based on the ticket use notification, where the updated past ticket usage data conveys whether the requesting entity presented the ticket themselves. |
| US09519795B2 |
Interconnect partition binding API, allocation and management of application-specific partitions
One system includes one or more host computing systems, each host computing system including at least one execution core and a system memory. The system includes a plurality of virtual partitions executing on the one or more host computing systems and including a first partition having at least a portion of the system memory associated with at least one of the one or more host computing systems and configure to store a database therein. The system also includes an interconnect layer communicatively connecting the plurality of virtual partitions, the interconnect layer providing a programming interface by which direct memory access operations between partitions are coordinated. In response to database commands received at the first partition, the data stored in the database is provided to a requesting partition a direct memory access operation. |
| US09519794B2 |
Desktop redaction and masking
Redacting material in a user interface is provided. A monitoring agent waits for a change in input or output of user content. A change comparator identifies the change for sensitive material. A type comparator identifies the type of sensitive material. A redaction engine redacts the change according to the identified type of sensitive material. |
| US09519787B2 |
Secure creation of encrypted virtual machines from encrypted templates
Booting a machine in a secure fashion in a potentially unsecure environment. The method includes a target machine beginning a boot process. The method further includes the target machine determining that it needs provisioning data to continue booting. The target machine contacts a secure infrastructure to obtain the provisioning data. The target machine provides an identity claim that can be verified by the secure infrastructure. As a result of the secure infrastructure verifying the identity claim, the target machine receives a request from the secure infrastructure to establish a key sealed to the target machine. The target machine provides the established key to the secure infrastructure. The target machine receives the provisioning data from the secure infrastructure. The provisioning data is encrypted to the established key. The target machine decrypts the encrypted provisioning data, and uses the provisioning data to finish booting. |
| US09519780B1 |
Systems and methods for identifying malware
A computer-implemented method for identifying malware may include (1) determining, for multiple commands within bytecode associated with a malware program, whether each command constitutes an invocation command, (2) filtering, based on the determination, invocation commands from the bytecode, (3) adding, for each invocation command filtered from the bytecode, an opcode, a format code, and a function prototype to a collection of opcodes, format codes, and function prototypes, (4) generating a digital fingerprint of the collection including the opcode, the format code, and the function prototype for each invocation command filtered from the bytecode, and (5) performing, by a computer security system, a remedial action to protect a user in response to detecting the presence of a variant of the malware program by determining that the digital fingerprint matches a candidate instance of bytecode under evaluation. Various other methods, systems, and computer-readable media are also disclosed. |
| US09519775B2 |
Pre-identifying probable malicious behavior based on configuration pathways
The various aspects include systems and methods for enabling mobile computing devices to recognize when they are at risk of experiencing malicious behavior in the near future given a current configuration. Thus, the various aspects enable mobile computing devices to anticipate malicious behaviors before a malicious behavior begins rather than after the malicious behavior has begun. In the various aspects, a network server may receive behavior vector information from multiple mobile computing devices and apply pattern recognition techniques to the received behavior vector information to identify malicious configurations and pathway configurations that may lead to identified malicious configurations. The network server may inform mobile computing devices of identified malicious configurations and the corresponding pathway configurations, thereby enabling mobile computing devices to anticipate and prevent malicious behavior from beginning by recognizing when they have entered a pathway configuration leading to malicious behavior. |
| US09519772B2 |
Relevancy improvement through targeting of information based on data gathered from a networked device associated with a security sandbox of a client device
A method, apparatus, and system related to relevancy improvement through targeting of information based on data gathered from a networked device associated with a security sandbox of a client device are disclosed. In one embodiment, a system may comprise a networked device, a relevancy-matching server, and a client device. The networked device may be configured to generate a preliminary data and/or a primary data associated with a user and automatically announce a sandbox-reachable service of the networked device to a discovery module. The relevancy-matching server may be configured to match a targeted data with the primary data based on a relevancy factor associated with the user. The client device may be configured to automatically process an identification data of the networked device and/or the sandbox-reachable service of the networked device from the discovery module and to automatically associate with the networked device based on the identification data. |
| US09519767B2 |
Apparatus and method for authenticating a combination code using a quick response code
An apparatus and a method are provided for authenticating a combination code using a Quick Response (QR) code. The apparatus includes a QR code receiver that receives an image frame including a QR code; a QR code recognizer that recognizes the QR code within the image frame; a combination code generator that generates a combination code including the QR code; and a combination code transmitter that transmits the combination code to an authentication server. |