Abstract: An alkaline electrolyte solution is electrolyzed by a diaphragm-less electrolyzer to provide electrolytic water as purging and disinfecting water. The alkaline electrolyte solution is a mixture of at least one alkaline electrolyte selected from caustic sodium carbonate, caustic potassium carbonate, phosphorous sodium carbonate and sodium hypochlorite, and at least one neutral salt selected from sodium chloride, potassium chloride, sodium bromide and potassium bromide. The purging and disinfecting water is added to a water circulatory system. The result is that contaminants and noxious chemicals in the circulatory system are oxidation decomposed to thereby purge the circulating water, and noxious microorganisms such as germs, yeasts, fungi, and viruses, growing in the water circulatory system and causing degradation of water or development of slime are disinfected and thereby purged from the water circulatory system. The purging and infecting method can be carried out in a simple manner with minimum cost.

Abstract: As a polymer exhibiting improved transparency which is suitable for a resist resin used in a chemical-amplification-type resist being applicable for photolithography using exposure light at 180 nm or shorter, this invention provides a polymer comprising a repeating unit resulting from polymerization of a monomer exhibiting a polymerization activity, wherein the monomer has a fluorine-containing acetal or ketal structure represented by general formula (1): wherein R represents an atomic group containing a carbon-carbon double bond exhibiting polymerization activity; at least one of R1 and R2 is fluorinated alkyl group or fluorinated aryl group having 1 to 20 carbon atoms; and R3 represents a radical selected from the group consisting of hydrogen atom, alkyl group, alkoxy-substituted alkyl group, fluorinated alkyl group, aryl group, fluorinated aryl group, aralkyl group and fluorinated aralkyl group having 1 to 20 carbon atoms.

Abstract: A redundancy replacement judging circuit includes a redundancy replacement judging circuit chain and a pseudo redundancy replacement judging circuit chain substantially equal in delay time to the redundancy replacement judging circuit chain. In response to an output of the pseudo redundancy replacement judging circuit chain, the redundancy replacement judging circuit outputs a redundancy judgment result of the redundancy replacement judging circuit chain. A semiconductor memory device includes the redundancy replacement judging circuit.

Abstract: A thin-film magnetic head is constituted by forming a lower shielding layer, a read gap layer holding an MR magnetosensitive element, a common pole layer, and a write gap layer in order on an insulating substrate, forming a first flattening layer, a coil pattern layer, and a second flattening layer laminated in order on the write gap layer excluding the vicinity of an ABS plane, and forming an upper pole layer on the write gap layer and the second flattening layer nearby an ABS plane. A concave portion is formed on the common pole layer at a position separated from the ABS plane, the concave portion is filled with a nonmagnetic body, and the gap depth between the upper pole layer and the common pole layer is determined by the concave portion.

Abstract: In order, to transmit differential signals between two printed boards, there is provided a printed board connector comprising an insulating connector housing and disk-shaped modules that contain electric contact elements and are arranged in the connector housing, wherein modules featuring signaling contacts and modules featuring shielding contacts are alternately arranged adjacent to one another. In this case, the shielding module is realized in such a way that signaling contact pairs arranged on top of one another are also at least regionally shielded relative to one another.

Abstract: A circular-shaped metal structure is fabricated by plastic-working and has a wall thickness in the range of 0.03 mm to 0.09 mm both inclusive. A film composed of one of (a) silicon and fluorocarbon resin and (b) copper is coated on a surface of the circular-shaped metal structure.

Abstract: A process for forming a pattern contains steps of: forming a first mask pattern on a film to be etched on a substrate; forming a first pattern of the film to be etched by using the first mask pattern as a mask; forming a second mask pattern having a plane shape different from that of the first mask pattern by deforming the first mask pattern; and forming a second pattern of the film to be etched different from the first pattern by using the second mask pattern. By applying the process for forming a pattern, for example, to the formation of a semiconductor layer and source and drain electrodes of a TFT substrate of a liquid crystal display apparatus, the above-stated formation requiring two photoresist process steps in a conventional manufacturing method of a liquid crystal display apparatus can be carried out by only one process step, thereby reducing manufacturing cost thereof.

Abstract: The invention relates to a surface plasmon resonance system method. The system has at least one light source operable to generate a source beam, a prism having a rear surface at least partially coated with a metallic coating and optionally a dielectric layer. At least one layer under test is positioned on the rear surface of the prism. The source beam is directed at the layer under test thereby defining an angle between the source beam and the rear surface of the prism. A detector is operable to detect light that is reflected or scattered by the layer under test. The source beam is directed towards the layer under test at a selected angle. The source beam is also shifted in at least one plane to illuminate a specific portion of the layer under test based on the selected relative angle and the position of the layer under test on the rear surface of the prism. The rear surface of the prism can be illuminated in one-dimensional or two-dimensional array like fashion.

Abstract: A semiconductor device manufacturing apparatus which uses a thermal CVD reaction to deposit a film onto a substrate has a ring with an electrode terminal that makes contact with either the substrate or the deposited film thereon, a power supply that applies a current or a potential to this electrode terminal of the ring, and a piston cylinder mechanism for moving the ring up and down, so as to cause its electrode terminal to make and break contact with the substrate or deposited film thereon.

Abstract: The health condition of a living organism is detected by electrochemically analyzing samples from selected areas of the body of said living organism for elevated free levels of nucleotide excision products resulting from DNA or RNA damage.

Abstract: An operating system has a top level exception handler which terminates an application as a default action upon receipt of any exceptions. An application recovery system traps an exception which is dispatched to the top level exception handler before it reaches the top level exception handler. In the event, an exception cannot be resolved, the application recovery system terminates a thread that caused the exception, and continues execution of the application.

Abstract: A liquid crystal display device which divides a pixel into a plurality of sub-pixels. In the liquid crystal display device, a gradation and a brightness in each of the sub-pixels have a non-linear relation to each other, and a desired brightness for the pixel is selected by selecting a gradation in each of the sub-pixels.

Abstract: Disclosed is a PLL circuit having a voltage-controlled oscillator, to which a difference voltage across non-inverting and inverting input terminals is input as a control voltage, for oscillating at a frequency in accordance with the control voltage; a phase comparator for comparing the phase of an output signal obtained by frequency-dividing the output of the voltage-controlled oscillator by a frequency-divider, with the phase of an input signal and outputting the result of this phase comparison; first and second loop filters connected at output terminals thereof to the non-inverting and inverting input terminals, respectively, of the voltage-controlled oscillator; and a charge pump, which is responsive to receipt of an UP signal supplied from the phase comparator, for supplying a first charging current from a PMOS transistor to a capacitor of the first loop filter and supplying a first discharge current from an NMOS transistor to a capacitor of the second loop filter, and which is responsive to receipt of a

Abstract: An acoustic event location and classification system comprising an array of at least two acoustic transducers arranged spaced from one another; a central data processing unit for receiving signals from the acoustic transducers and processing the signals to determine a event type and location; and an internet or LAN connection for transmitting event type and location data to a third party, wherein the central data processing unit uses a DSNN to determine the event type and generalized cross correlation functions between microphone pairs to determine the event location.

Abstract: Disclosed is a method of forming bump electrodes on wired circuit boards. A high-concentration impurity Si template doped with boron and having a pit formed therein is prepared. A plated resist is formed on the high-concentration impurity Si template and an opening is formed at the position of the pit. Then, an electric field is applied to the high-concentration impurity Si template and Au is buried in the opening in the plated resist to form a Au-plated buried layer. An electrode pad is formed on a semiconductor chip. With the plated resist separated from the high-concentration impurity Si template, the electrode pad of the semiconductor chip is aligned with the Au-plated buried layer and is bonded by thermo-compression bonding. The Au-plated buried layer is transferred to the electrode pad to form an Au bump on the semiconductor chip.

Abstract: A thin layer of hafnium oxide or stacking of thin layers comprising hafnium oxide layers for producing surface treatments of optical components, or optical components, in which at least one layer of hafnium oxide is in amorphous form and has a density less than 8 gm/cm3. The layer is formed by depositing on a substrate without energy input to the substrate.

Abstract: A method and apparatus for visualizing sub-micron size particles employs a polarizing microscope wherein a focused beam of polarized light is projected onto a target, and a portion of the illuminating light is blocked from reaching the specimen, whereby to produce a shadow region, and projecting diffracted light from the target onto the shadow region.