Abstract: A locking component for locking a medical device onto a guide wire. Such medical devices include, for example, an embolic filter assembly used to capture embolic material that may be created and released into a patient's vasculature during a stenting or angioplasty procedure. The embolic filter assembly tracks along the guide wire, and is delivered to a treatment site where it is locked in place and deployed. The locking component enables the filter assembly to lock onto any standard guide wire, and does not require a modified guide wire that has a specially-designed fitting or stop to accomplish the locking function.

Abstract: A bone marrow aspiration device is described. In one embodiment, the bone marrow aspiration device includes a central body portion having a proximal end and a distal end, and an outer shaft portion coupled to the distal end of the central body portion. The outer shaft portion also has a distal opening. A first lumen is formed by the central body portion and the outer shaft portion, and the first lumen extends from the proximal end to the distal opening. An aspiration needle is disposed within the first lumen. The aspiration needle has a substantially linear configuration when positioned within the first lumen, and a substantially curved configuration when extended from the distal opening. The aspiration needle is adapted to aspirate liquid bone marrow from a first region of a bone cavity.

Abstract: A locking component for locking a medical device onto a guide wire. Such medical devices include, for example, an embolic filter assembly used to capture embolic material that may be created and released into a patient's vasculature during a stenting or angioplasty procedure. The embolic filter assembly tracks along the guide wire, and is delivered to a treatment site where it is locked in place and deployed. The locking component enables the filter assembly to lock onto any standard guide wire, and does not require a modified guide wire that has a specially-designed fitting or stop to accomplish the locking function.

Abstract: An intravascular stent includes an eluting sheath fabricated from a mesh for controlled release of therapeutic drugs and for delivery of the therapeutic drugs in localized drug therapy in a blood vessel. The eluting sheath is attached to at least a portion of an outside surface area of the stent structure and is fabricated from a mesh designed to neck down in response to a radially outward directed force resulting in the uniform expansion of the stent. The eluting sheath can be loaded with at least one therapeutic drug for the release thereof at a treatment site to facilitate repair of a damaged vessel. The stent has a high degree of flexibility in the longitudinal direction, yet has adequate vessel wall coverage and radial strength sufficient to hold open an artery or other body lumen.

Abstract: An intravascular stent includes an eluting sheath fabricated from a mesh for controlled release of therapeutic drugs and for delivery of the therapeutic drugs in localized drug therapy in a blood vessel. The eluting sheath is attached to at least a portion of an outside surface area of the stent structure and is fabricated from a mesh designed to neck down in response to a radially outward directed force resulting in the uniform expansion of the stent. The eluting sheath can be loaded with at least one therapeutic drug for the release thereof at a treatment site to facilitate repair of a damaged vessel. The stent has a high degree of flexibility in the longitudinal direction, yet has adequate vessel wall coverage and radial strength sufficient to hold open an artery or other body lumen.

Abstract: A method for training a receiving modem is disclosed. The receiving modem can be trained by a sending modem via a four-segment training procedure. During segment 1 training, the sending modem waits for silence on a transmission line between the sending modem and the receiving modem for 48 symbol intervals. Then, the sending modem performs segment 2 training by sending alternating AB symbols to the receiving modem for 64 symbol intervals. During segment 3 training, the sending modem sends CD symbols to the receiving modem for 64 symbol intervals in order to train an equalizer within the receiving modem. During segment 4 training, the sending modem continues to train the equalizer within the receiving modem by sending scrambled binary “1” symbols to the receiving modem for 48 symbol intervals. After a successful completion of the segment 4 training, the receiving modem can change to a data mode to begin detecting and receiving data from the sending modem.

Abstract: A digital signal processor (DSP), hardware module, and shared memory coupled together to perform Viterbi decoding on a sequence of received symbols. Given channel coefficients, the DSP calculates initial data for Viterbi processing: combination values for each possible state and branch product values for each possible symbol. These values are stored in shared memory for access by the hardware module. The DSP further calculates the first few stages of the Viterbi processing so path metrics are well defined for every state. Path metric values are also stored into the shared memory. The hardware module is optimized to perform calculations associated with a single stage of the Viterbi algorithm. The DSP invokes by the hardware module by passing a received sample to the hardware module. The hardware module calculates a survivor state value and minimizing path metric value for each state in the state space.

Abstract: The present invention comprises a system and method for a GSM receiver to perform channel estimation under the assumption that the analog-to-digital (A/D) converter is free-running. A search process is employed, whereby the known GSM training signal is sampled with a plurality of phases which vary incrementally from zero to a full symbol period. For each phase a sample set (of the training signal) is generated. Furthermore, each sample set is used, together with the received samples, in a cross-correlation procedure to obtain a candidate impulse response vector for the transmission channel. Thus a plurality of candidate impulse response vectors are produced, one of which will be selected to be the optimal representative for the transmission channel. The optimal impulse response vector is selected as follows. Each impulse response vector is convolved with the corresponding sample set, thus producing an estimated output vector.