A support arm for a water-cooled, current-conducting electrode includes wall elements, wherein each wall element is a flat conductive metal with a hollowed out recess on its outer surface extending over its length. The support arm further includes a cover extending over each recess to define a closed cooling channel within each wall element when the cover is welded to the wall element. The cover includes with an inlet port and an outlet port for cooling water.

The present invention relates generally to a ladle metallurgy furnace having an improved roof structure. The improved roof may comprise an internal surface structure having a substantially smooth exterior surface, an external surface structure spaced apart from the internal surface structure, a plurality of channels that are defined intermediate the internal and external surface structures, a supply port in fluid communication with at least one channel through the second surface structure and in further fluid communication with a supply line, and a return port in fluid communication with at least one channel through the external surface structure and in further fluid communication with a return line.

An electromagnetic induction melting furnace to control an average nominal diameter of the TiB2 cluster of the Al—Ti—B alloy includes a main body containing the melted alloy; and a multi-layer coil disposed on the main body, wherein a frequency of the alternative current of each coil of the multi-layer coil is different, and the alloy is heated by inducing a magnetic field generated by the alternative currents. The selection of the frequency and the changeable magnetic field may reduce the cohesion force between the TiB2 grains of the Al—Ti—B alloy to control the average nominal diameter of the TiB2 cluster.

An electromagnetic induction melting furnace to control an average nominal diameter of the TiC cluster of the Al—Ti—C alloy includes a main body containing the melted alloy; and a multi-layer coil disposed on the main body, wherein a frequency of the alternative current of each coil of the multi-layer coil is different, and the alloy is heated by inducing a magnetic field generated by the alternative currents. The selection of the frequency and the changeable magnetic field may reduce the cohesion force between the TiC grains of the Al—Ti—C alloy to control the average nominal diameter of the TiC cluster.

An aluminum alloy propeller shaft including a tube made of an aluminum alloy, and a pair of yoke members made of an aluminum alloy, the yoke members including cylindrical base portions friction-welded to opposite end portions of the tube, each of the yoke members including a tip end portion having a pair of bearing retaining holes aligned with each other in a radial direction of the base portion. Variation in length between a central axis of the bearing retaining holes in one of the yoke members and a central axis of the bearing retaining holes in the other yoke member with respect to a reference length is set within a range of from +2.0 mm to −2.0 mm. A friction welding process of producing an aluminum alloy propeller shaft, including a friction step, a position displacement detection step, a rotation stop step and an upset step.

A ball-detent torque-limiting assembly has breakout means for maintaining an axial separation distance between opposing pocketed surfaces of the assembly once the primary balls of the assembly have rolled out of their pockets, wherein the axial separation distance maintained by the breakout means is at least as great as the diameter of the balls. The breakout means may include a plurality of secondary balls deployed in a breakout event. The breakout means assumes the axially directed spring load that urges the opposing pocketed surfaces together, thereby preventing the primary balls from entering and exiting the pockets in quick and violent succession following breakout and avoiding damage to the torque-limiting assembly. The torque-limiting assembly is resettable by counter-rotation following a breakout event.

A system and methods are provided for controlling a motor of a rod pumping system using previous RPMs of the motor and predicting an RPM of the motor; correcting a power factor of a motor of a rod pumping system; allocating energy consumption and allocating energy generation for a set of wells connected to an electricity meter using an amount of energy generated by each well; and generating an alert if a set of data is beyond a threshold for the set of data.

It is an object of the present invention to provide antimicrobial metallodrugs comprising an antimicrobial peptide (“AMP”) and/or an antibiotic covalently bound to a metal binding moiety. These metallodrugs combine a metal binding domain which typically catalyzes oxido-reductase chemistry or acts as a Lewis-Acid catalyst, with a member of a diverse class of antimicrobial agents currently validated in preclinical and clinical settings for the treatment of a broad spectrum of pathogenic organisms.

The purpose of the present invention is to provide novel liquid crystalline compounds that are capable of inducing phase transition by a light stimulus and are useful in the display, optoelectronics, and photonics field. The present invention relates to the liquid crystalline compounds represented by general formula (1): wherein R1, R2 and R3 are independently selected from the group consisting of hydrogen, alkyl, alkoxyl, alkoxycarbonyl, alkoxycarbonyloxy, alkanoyl, alkanoyloxy, alkoxyphenyl, and N-alkylaminocarbonyl, and n is an integer.

The present invention is directed to novel organometallic complexes as catalysts for the reaction of compounds with isocyanate and hydroxyl functional groups to form urethane and/or polyurethane and the process employing such catalysts. More particularly, the present invention is directed to novel complexes of zinc(II) with substituted amidines. These novel catalysts are useful for the production of urethanes and polyurethanes which are important in many industrial applications.

The present invention relates to a method of differentially diagnosing different types of dementia. In particular, the method relates to the use of specific SPECT tracers for differentially diagnosing Alzheimer's disease, Lewy-Body Dementia, and Frontotemporal Dementia.

The present invention relates to a process to dissolve plutonium or a plutonium alloy, by placing it in contact with an aqueous dissolution mixture, wherein said dissolution mixture comprises nitric acid, a carboxylic acid with complexing properties with respect to plutonium, and a compound comprising at least one —NH2 radical such as urea. The invention also relates to a process to convert plutonium or a plutonium alloy into plutonium oxide and to manufacture nuclear fuel from said oxide.The invention particularly applies to the dismantling of plutonium contained in nuclear weapons with a view to its use in civilian nuclear reactors, particularly in the form of MOX fuel.

Decontamination of nuclear facilities is necessary to reduce the radiation field during normal operations and decommissioning of complex equipment. In this invention, we discuss gel and foam based diphosphonic acid (HEDPA) chemical solutions that are unique in that these solutions can be applied at room temperature; provide protection to the base metal for continued applications of the equipment; and reduce the final waste form production to one step. The HEDPA gels and foams are formulated with benign chemicals, including various solvents, such as ionic liquids and reducing and complexing agents such as hydroxamic acids, and formaldehyde sulfoxylate. Gel and foam based HEDPA processes allow for decontamination of difficult to reach surfaces that are unmanageable with traditional aqueous process methods. Also, the gel and foam components are optimized to maximize the dissolution rate and assist in the chemical transformation of the gel and foam to a stable waste form.

A reactor installation tool and method for installing a reactor unit in a reactor tube. A reactor installation tool including a movable assembly and a fixed assembly linked together such that the movable assembly can be adjusted relative to the fixed assembly. The movable assembly including a reactor sleeve attachment means for releasably securing a reactor sleeve loaded with a reactor unit to the tool. The fixed assembly including an expandable clamping unit for releasably securing the tool to a reactor tube. A reactor unit can be installed in the reactor tube by adjusting the movable assembly to extract the reactor unit from the reactor sleeve as the fixed assembly is rigidly secured to the reactor tube. The fixed assembly can be released from the reactor tube and the reactor installation tool can be removed from the reactor tube.

A reactor installation tool and method for installing a reactor unit in a reactor tube. A reactor installation tool including a movable assembly and a fixed assembly linked together such that the movable assembly can be adjusted relative to the fixed assembly. The movable assembly including a reactor sleeve attachment means for releasably securing a reactor sleeve loaded with a reactor unit to the tool. The fixed assembly including an expandable clamping unit for releasably securing the tool to a reactor tube. A reactor unit can be installed in the reactor tube by adjusting the movable assembly to extract the reactor unit from the reactor sleeve as the fixed assembly is rigidly secured to the reactor tube. The fixed assembly can be released from the reactor tube and the reactor installation tool can be removed from the reactor tube.

The present invention relates to a hypoallergenic molecule consisting of Bet v Ia or an allergen having at least 40% identity to Bet v Ia comprising mutations of at least four amino acid residues in the region of amino acids 100 to 125 of Bet v Ia or its corresponding region of the allergen having at least 40% identity to Bet v 1a.

Disclosed is a hot-dip galvanized steel sheet or an alloyed hot-dip galvanized steel sheet, which has a tensile strength of 980 MPa or more, excellent workability, high yield ratio and high strength. The hot-dip galvanized steel sheet or the alloyed hot-dip galvanized steel sheet is characterized by containing 0.12-0.3% by mass of C, 0.1% by mass or less (excluding 0% by mass) of Si, 2.0-3.5% by mass of Mn, 0.05% by mass or less (excluding 0% by mass) of P, 0.05% by mass or less (excluding 0% by mass) of S, 0.005-0.1% by mass of Al and 0.015% by mass or less (excluding 0% by mass) of N, with the balance made up of iron and unavoidable impurities. The hot-dip galvanized steel sheet or the alloyed hot-dip galvanized steel sheet is also characterized in that the metallic structure thereof contains bainite as a matrix structure, and the area ratio of ferrite is 3-20% and the area ratio of martensite is 10-35% relative to the entire structure.

In some embodiments, an improved mechanical adhesion of copper metallization to dielectric with partially cured epoxy fillers is presented. In this regard, a substrate build-up film is introduced having epoxy material and a plurality of epoxy microspheres, wherein an interior of the microspheres is not fully cured. Other embodiments are also disclosed and claimed.

A liquid crystalline polyester composition containing at least 100 parts by weight of liquid crystalline polyester (A) and 10 to 100 parts by weight of talc (B). The talc (B) has a ratio (a1/a2) of oil absorption (a1) ml/100 g to specific surface area (a2) m2/g in a range of 14.0 to 26.0 (ml·g)/(100 g·m2) and has a number-average particle diameter of 10 to 30 μm.

Compositions and methods for the treatment of asthma and inflammatory ocular disorders are disclosed.

Method and apparatus are provided for mechanically processing an organ or organs taken out from slaughtered poultry in a processing device or processing line, which organ or organs form part of an organ package and wherein the organ or organs are separated from the organ package. The organ package is spatially oriented by the processing device without notably breaking tissue connections in the package, and in a preselected order so as to cause the harvesting of organs from the package to occur in a preselected sequence that depends on the location of the organ package in the processing device or processing line.

Method and apparatus are provided for mechanically processing an organ or organs taken out from slaughtered poultry in a processing device or processing line, which organ or organs form part of an organ package and wherein said organ or organs are separated from the organ package. The organ package is spatially oriented by the processing device without notably breaking tissue connections in the package, and in a preselected order so as to cause harvesting of organs from the package to occur in a preselected sequence that depends on the location of the organ package in the processing device or processing line.

The invention concerns a fish transporting apparatus for automatically feeding fish to a fish processing machine. The fish transporting apparatus can include a transport device with a bottom element for receiving the fish and lateral boundary elements for guiding the fish as well as a vibrating member for vibratory driving of the transport device, which is distinguished in that the bottom element is constructed as a grid plate with rectangular apertures. Furthermore, the invention concerns a device for aligning fish in a head/tail orientation with such a fish transporting apparatus.

A modular, intrinsically-safe power module assembly is provided. The assembly includes a rigid conduit adapter configured to mount to a conduit of a field device. A housing, having an interior, is operably coupled to the rigid conduit adapter and is physically supported by the rigid conduit adapter. At least one non-rechargeable battery is disposed within the housing. Intrinsic safety circuitry is coupled to the at least one non-rechargeable battery, and is coupled to a connector that mates with a cooperative connector in the rigid conduit adapter.

The disclosed embodiments provide a battery pack for use with a portable electronic device. The battery pack includes a first set of cells with different capacities electrically coupled in a parallel configuration. Cells within the first set of cells may also have different thicknesses and/or dimensions. The first set of cells is arranged within the battery pack to facilitate efficient use of space within a portable electronic device. For example, the first set of cells may be arranged to accommodate components in the portable electronic device.

A negative electrode active material for an electric device, including an alloy having a composition formula SixZnyAlz, where x++y=100 , 26≦x≦47, 18≦y≦44, and 22≦z≦46 are satisfied.

A gaming system (10, 100) implementing a base game and a feature game. A game controller (101) controls play of the game. The gaming system has at least one display (14, 106) and a player interface (107). The feature game comprises at least one series of game events, in which a plurality of symbols from at least one predetermined symbol set that includes at least first and second symbols, are randomly selected and displayed on the at least one display (14, 106). The feature game is a challenge feature and during play of the feature game, the game controller (101) maintains in computer memory (103) counters for said at least first and second symbols, varies the value of said counters on the occurrence of the at least first and second symbols and causes the at least one display to show a value of the counters. The values of the counters are evaluated against predetermined competitive criteria to determine the outcome of the series of game events.

A fitness challenge program designed to encourage physical activity as well as to entertain and engage participants. Individuals are organized into teams and compete individually as well as against other teams. The program incorporates the use of computer technology to record physical activity and track progress for individuals as well as their teams. The individual and team activity information is posted to a web site accessible to the participants. Each participant has an account and can access his or her activity data through the web site. Team progress can also be viewed in the form of activity level data as well as movement to various locations associated with activity levels. The program incorporates educational content that is tied to team progress in the challenge. The program may be organized and administered through the middle schools that student participants attend.

In one embodiment, a system includes a robotic accessor for transporting media between multiple storage slots and one or more data storage drives; a controller for controlling the robotic accessor; a memory in communication with and/or integrated with the controller for storing information about the media and the storage slots, the information including data corresponding to a physical distribution of the media in the storage slots; and logic integrated with and/or executable by the controller, the logic being adapted to: position the robotic accessor at a computed optimal position during an idle period of the robotic accessor, the computed optimal position being based at least in part on the physical distribution of the media in the storage slots.

A heat-assisted magnetic recording (HAMR) air-bearing slider has an optically-transparent protective film over the near-field transducer (NFT) to protect the NFT from excessive heat caused by the accumulation of carbonaceous material on the slider's overcoat. The NFT is thus separated from the overcoat by the protective film. The protective film does not cover the write pole end, which is covered only by the overcoat, so there is no spacing loss between the write pole end and the recording layer on the disk. In one embodiment the protective film is coplanar with the recording-layer-facing surface of the slider and the overcoat covers both the protective film and the write pole end. In another embodiment the overcoat has a window that surrounds the protective film, with the protective film being substantially coplanar with the air-bearing surface (ABS) of the slider. In both embodiments the smooth topography of the slider's ABS is maintained.

A method and system provide a magnetic transducer having an air-bearing surface (ABS). The magnetic transducer includes a main pole and at least one coil for energizing the main pole. The coil(s) have a number of turns. The magnetic transducer also includes at least one shunt coupled to at least one of the number of turns. At least one remaining turn of the number of turns carries a current. The shunt(s) carry a portion of the current from the shunted turn of the number of turns. Thus, the coil(s) have an effective number of turns is less than the number of turns.

A magnetic recording medium including a substrate, and at least one magnetic layer formed on the substrate. The magnetic layer is formed from an alloy containing Cobalt, and Platinum (Pt). The magnetic layer is also formed from grain boundary segregation materials comprising Manganese Oxide and at least one of Silicon Oxide, Chromium Oxide, and Cobalt Oxide (CoO).

Methods for providing magnetic storage elements with high magneto-resistance using Heusler alloys are provided. One such method includes depositing a substrate including NiFe, depositing a seed layer on the substrate, depositing a buffer layer on the seed layer, and growing, epitaxially, an upper layer on the buffer layer, the upper layer including a Heusler alloy.

A disk drive is disclosed comprising a disk, and a slider comprising a head, where the head comprises a write component electrically insulated from the slider. A bias voltage is applied to the write component, and a current flowing between the write component and the disk is measured, wherein the current is indicative of a fly height of the head.

A ball-screw assembly isolator is provided, and includes a housing; a ball-screw, a bearing assembly, a retaining member, a first compressible member and a second compressible member. The bearing assembly is located between the housing and the ball-screw. The bearing assembly includes an outer race. The retaining member is secured by the housing. The first compressible member is positioned between the housing and the outer race. The second compressible member is positioned between the outer race and the retaining member. The retaining member is configured to be preloaded to exert an axial force upon the first compressible member and the second compressible member.

Embodiments of the invention are directed to bearing assemblies configured to effectively provide heat distribution from and/or heat dissipation for bearing element, bearing apparatuses including such bearing assemblies, and methods of operating such bearing assemblies and apparatuses. In an embodiment, a bearing assembly includes a plurality of superhard bearing elements distributed about an axis. Each superhard bearing element of the plurality of superhard bearing elements has a superhard material including a superhard surface. Additionally, a support ring structure that includes a support ring that supports the plurality of superhard bearing elements and a thermally-conductive structure in thermal communication with the superhard table of each of the plurality of superhard bearing elements. The thermally-conductive structure has a higher thermal conductivity than the support ring of the support ring structure.

A retainer of synthetic resin is provided in such a way that abnormal heat generation in a bearing and wear of the retainer due to interference between the retainer and balls are less likely to arise while the bearing is rotating at a high speed. A retainer (5) of synthetic resin includes two annular members (10) made of synthetic resin and facing each other in the axial direction, the annular members defining therebetween a plurality of circumferentially spaced apart pockets (11) in which respective balls (4) are received. Concave spherical surfaces (23) are formed at the circumferential ends of the respective pockets (11) so as to extend along the outer peripheries of the balls (4), and cylindrical surfaces (22) are formed at the axial ends of the respective pockets (11).

A tolerance ring can include a generally cylindrical body having a sidewall. The sidewall can include a plurality of wave structures extending from the sidewall at regular intervals around the body, a first unformed section between a first pair of adjacent wave structures, and a second unformed section between a second pair of adjacent wave structures. The gap can extend along an entire length, L, of the body to establish a split in the body. The second unformed section can include a slot therein. The slot can have a length, LS, and LS≧80% L.

Dynamically-lubricated bearings and methods of dynamically lubricating bearings, including bearings used in gas turbine engines. Such a bearing includes an inner race having an inner race groove between a pair of inner race cage lands, an outer race having an outer race groove between a pair of outer race cage lands and opposes the inner race groove, rolling elements disposed between the inner and outer races and in rolling contact with the inner and outer race grooves, and a cage disposed between the inner and outer races to maintain separation between the rolling elements. A lubricant is introduced into a cavity between the inner and outer races, and rotation of the inner race relative to the outer race causes the lubricant to exit the cavity through recessed surface features in at least one of the inner and outer race cage lands.

A roller bearing cage has a cage element adapted for retaining the generally cylindrically shaped rollers and allowing the rollers to be rollable therein. The cage element includes a main portion having a plurality of pockets, an outward flange portion extending outwardly in a radial direction and an inward flange portion extending outwardly in the radial direction. The outward flange portion is formed on a side edge of the main portion and the inward flange is formed on an opposite side edge portion thereof. The main portion defines the smallest diameter of the bearing cage and is less than the roller pitch diameter.

A bearing support plate for use in a generator has a radially enlarged flange with a first cylindrical portion extending from the flange in one direction which will provide a bearing support for an outer race of a ball bearing, and a radially inner cylindrical portion extending in an opposed direction that will be away from the ball bearing relative to the flange. The flange is generally cylindrical but has a truncated portion over a circumferential extent. The first cylindrical portion is formed with radially enlarged portions with intermediate radially thinner portions. The flange includes bolt holes circumferentially aligned with the radially thinner portions.

In one embodiment, a method allows an application running in a first process to communicate with a second process. A file system filter driver receives a command from the application for a file. The file system filter driver is configured to process file system commands. The file system filter driver determines that the command is for an inter-process communication with a service running in the second process based on the command being for the file. Then, the file system filter driver sends the command to the service running in the second process where the command is processed by the service. A response from the service is received based on the command being processed by the service and the file system filter driver sends the response to the application.

Administering message acknowledgements in a parallel computer that includes compute nodes, with each compute node including a processor and a messaging accelerator, includes: storing in a list, by a processor of a compute node, a message descriptor describing a message and an acknowledgement request descriptor describing a request for an acknowledgement of receipt of the message; processing, by a messaging accelerator of the compute node, the list, including transmitting, to a target compute node, the message described by the message descriptor and transmitting, to the target compute node, the request described by the acknowledgement request descriptor; receiving, by the messaging accelerator from the target compute node, an acknowledgement of receipt of the message, including notifying the processor of receipt of the acknowledgement; and removing, by the processor from the list, the message descriptor and the acknowledgment request descriptor.

Techniques are described for utilizing synchronous APIs which normally block callers until a result is returned. In particular, the techniques described herein enable an application or other programming construct to boost performance by executing synchronous APIs (e.g., long running time APIs) within a proxy container rather than executing the synchronous APIs in the context of the application itself. Since the proxy is a separate process or thread, the caller application is thereby released from waiting for the synchronous API call and may proceed with other processing instead of waiting for the synchronous API to return. The application may then monitor the proxy to determine whether a result has been received, such as by periodically polling the proxy.

A system and a method are disclosed for batch execution of system calls in an operating system. In one implementation, a processing device configures a system call batching buffer table in a user space of an operating system, the system call batching buffer table including a plurality of system call units, associates a system call number with the system call batching buffer table, and issues a trap instruction to a kernel of the operating system to execute at least one of the plurality of system call units, the trap instruction including the system call number.

An exemplary method includes a broker-based messaging system detecting a request provided by a software application for the software application to connect to any one of a plurality of brokers included in a cluster of brokers, dynamically identifying, in response to the request and in accordance with a connection distribution heuristic, a broker included in the cluster of brokers and that is available for connection to the software application, and attempting to establish a connection between the software application and the broker. Corresponding methods and systems are also disclosed.

Through an asynchronous callback enhancement, a thread makes a non-blocking request (e.g., send, receive, I/O) to a message passing interface library, and a callback routine is associated with the request as an asynchronous callback to the thread. The callback is queued for execution in the requesting thread and so has a deterministic execution context. Callback queuing may occur in response to another thread detecting that the request is complete. Further control over callback execution is provided by state transitions which determine whether the thread is open to processing (e.g., executing) an asynchronous callback. Callback association is done by a broad or by narrow association routines. An application which has processes organized in ranks, each including a communication thread with associated callback(s), and multiple worker threads. Interruptible wait enhancements may also be present.

A technique is provided for handling dynamically linked subject function calls arranged pass subject control flow to an intermediate control structure such as a procedure linkage table, then to subject linker code for modifying link information associated with the subject function calls during translation of subject code into target code in a dynamic binary translator. The subject code for execution on a subject processor is received by a translator, and corresponding target code for execution on the target processor is generated. The translator is arranged to build a function linkage table containing an entry giving the location of each function called by the subject code, so that code can be generated by the translator in which subject function calls are associated with code for performing the function, without generating target code corresponding to the intermediate control structure.

Provided are a supported metallocene catalyst, a method for preparing the same and a method for preparing polyolefin using the same. The supported metallocene catalyst prepared by incorporating a metallocene compound having a ligand substituted with alkoxide or aryloxide into a conventional supported metallocene catalyst and incorporating a borate compound as a second co-catalyst exhibits considerably superior catalyst activity and easily controls molecular weight distribution, as compared to the conventional metallocene-supported catalyst.

The present invention provides a polymerizable compound represented by the following formula (I), a polymerizable composition that includes the polymerizable compound and an initiator, a polymer obtained by polymerizing the polymerizable compound or the polymerizable composition, and an optically anisotropic article that includes the polymer. The polymerizable compound, polymerizable composition, and polymer have a practical low melting point, exhibit an excellent solubility in a general-purpose solvent, can be produced at low cost, and may produce an optical film that achieves uniform conversion of polarized light over a wide wavelength band, and an optically anisotropic article.