Abstract: The present invention is directed to a mixing unit comprising a sealed container joined to a second container. When the second container is fully united with the sealed container, a seal in the sealed container is breached and the contents of the first container and the second container can be mixed. The seal is breached by a bushing enclosed within the sealed container or enclosed in a coupler between the sealed container and the second container which is advanced against the seal, and ruptures the seal when the second container is advanced into the coupler of the coupler portion of the sealed container.

Abstract: A method and system for transmitting bit streams in a telecommunication system, by combining a bit stream with a first portion of a preamble, applying power loading to the combined bit stream, applying eigen-steering to the power loaded bit stream, and combining a second portion of the preamble with the eigen-steered bit stream for transmission. The first portion of the preamble includes an HT preamble, and the second portion of the preamble includes a legacy preamble.

Abstract: A method and system for generating a user interface in a plurality of multiple devices connected to the network system for controlling devices that are currently connected to a network. A network system includes a physical layer, wherein the physical layer provides a communication medium than can be used by devices to communicate with each other, and multiple devices connected to the physical layer, one or more of the multiple devices storing information including device information.

Abstract: Described herein is a hydraulic servo for a gear change provided with a control shaft; the servo has: a frame; a first hydraulic actuator, which is carried by the frame and has two first chambers, which are alternatively filled with a pressurized fluid for displacing the control shaft axially in the two directions; two first solenoid valves, which control filling of the two first chambers; a second hydraulic actuator, which is carried by the frame and has at least one second chamber that is filled with a pressurized fluid for rotating the control shaft about its central axis; a second solenoid valve, which controls filling of the second chamber; and a supporting body, which is fixed to the frame, houses the solenoid valves, and has inside it a series of hydraulic circuits, which connect the solenoid valves themselves both to the chambers of the actuators and to a supply of the pressurized fluid.

Abstract: A quick connect power take-off assembly adapted for an all-terrain vehicle (ATV). The quick connect power take-off assembly includes a housing, a driving assembly that is fixedly mounted to the ATV, a driven assembly that is releasably connected to the driving assembly, and either directly to an implement or to a power transfer assembly. The power transfer assembly includes a rotationally-driven power transfer assembly and a second slip joint coupler connected to the input shaft of the power transfer assembly, and a quick connect plate on the engine-facing side of the rotationally-driven power transfer assembly. The quick connect plate is releasably connected to the power transfer assembly on an outwardly facing side and releasably connected to the second slip joint coupler on an engine-facing side thereof. The power transfer assembly is axially engaged with the engine shaft and receives rotational energy there from.

Abstract: A method for interpolating pixel data of an omitted line by use of pixel data from an interlaced scan, for de-interlacing an interlaced video image. Image edge direction is detected at the center position of every two neighboring scan lines in an interlaced scan. All the directions detected in a given field constitute an edge orientation map. Edge directions are filtered to remove false and unreliable edge directions from the edge orientation map. If an edge direction is removed, the vertical edge direction is used to replace that direction in the edge orientation map. For interpolating a new pixel at the center of two neighboring scan lines, the corresponding direction for that position is used as the interpolation direction to calculate the value of the new pixel. If the direction is vertical, a filter is used along the vertical direction to calculate the interpolation value.

Abstract: A system and method for controlling the gain in the forward signal path of a digital predistortion linearizer is disclosed. The loop gain of the predistortion system is driven to unity, where a separately controlled constant-gain observation path allows accurate gain control of the forward path. This is divided into digital gain from the predistortion function and analog gain from a Voltage Variable Attenuator (VVA) in the transmitter. The invention balances the distribution between these two domains in order to maximize dynamic range and minimize noise in the forward signal path. In order to distribute the forward path gain accurately, the characteristic of the VVA must be well known. Since these devices tend to be non-linear, with variable characteristic over temperature and batch, the invention compensates for this non-linear behavior by tracking the varying transfer characteristic of the VVA, giving a predictable local characteristic.

Abstract: An image processing system for implementing a variant of Retinex algorithm based on local illumination correction is provided to improve an intensity value of each position of an input image. The image processing system provides the ability to distinguish details when compressing dynamic range of a given image. Specifically, first the illumination of the image is estimated by performing a weighted low pass filter (WLPF) operation, and the original image is separated into the illumination and the reflectance images. Next, the estimated illumination is modified by using a non-linear mapping function based on local illumination at each pixel location. Then, the modified illumination image is combined with the reflectance image. Finally, an enhanced image is obtained after a contrast correction procedure.

Abstract: A method to manage data located on networked devices is provided. The method includes replicating objects residing on the devices and collecting information about at least one of the objects or the devices. The method further includes receiving input on desired information governance policies and outcomes and analyzing the replicated objects, collected information and received input to determine an information governance action.

Abstract: An improved LDPC encoding with concatenation rule and code size with packet lengths specified in octets is provided. The LDPC block size is selected to be an integer number of OFDM tones. The concatenation rule is an improvement of the shortening and puncturing scheme for low data rate. The improvement is two fold. First, the code length is selected based on the number of transmitted information bits in octets (HTLENGTH). Second, it is determined whether one extra OFDM symbol padding should be added based on the number of shortening bits in the last codeword and the available padding bits in the last OFDM symbol.

Abstract: A liquid insurance contract (LIC) comprises a security which is traded or tradable and which has cash flows to the issuer based upon a liability whose exact value is unknown at the time of issuance.

Abstract: A system and method of digitally predistorting a transmitter that has a digital input, up-converter, and a RF amplifier is disclosed. A digital predistorter preferably employs three paths for the digital input signal: a linear path, a memoryless digital predistortion path, and a memory based digital predistortion path. The memoryless path is preferably a look up table (LUT) of gain error corrections indexed to the input magnitude or input power. The linear path is separated to preserve the dynamic range of the system and avoid quantization associated with memoryless LUT correction. The memory based digital predistortion path filters the power envelope, or higher even order modes of the input signal magnitude, employing a hierarchical filter, to produce a gain correction. The input signal is modulated by the gain error corrections produced by the memoryless and memory based paths.

Abstract: An improved temporal noise reduction method and system detects the global motion and adjusts the overall gain of the temporal filtering. Temporal noise reduction is applied to two video frames, wherein one video frame is the current input noisy frame, and the other video frame is a previous filtered frame stored in memory. In this method, noise estimation is first performed to estimate the noise variance/standard deviation in the input video sequence. Then, motion estimation is applied to obtain the motion vectors indicating relative motion between the pixels in the current noisy frame and the corresponding pixels in the previous noise-reduced frame. From such motion vectors, global motion estimation is applied to estimate the camera motion of the video sequence. If reliable global motion is obtained, the overall gain of the temporal filtering is reduced by adjusting the estimated noise level. Motion blur is thus prevented.

Abstract: A handheld heating tool has a pair of elliptical reflectors with the major axes of the ellipses being at an acute angle to each other and intersecting in a focal region including one focus of each ellipse. A pair of incandescent bulbs are mounted so that each bulb filament is at the other focus of one of the elliptical reflectors. Thus, radiant energy from both bulbs is concentrated at the focal region. This focal region lies in a channel at the front of the housing of the tool. An object to be heated lying in the channel receives radiant energy from the lamps and reflectors. A blower directs cooling air toward the reflectors and along different paths within the housing to exit through the channel. One such path is between the outside of the reflectors and adjacent reflector shields.

Abstract: A video scaling process system, wherein the high frequency components of the input video sequence are compensated for, prior to video scaling. The video scaling system includes a pre-compensator for compensation of the high frequency components of the input video sequence, and a video scaler. The pre-compensator includes a high frequency component extractor, a noise detector and a shoot suppressor. The high frequency component extractor extracts the high frequency compensation component from an input video sequence. The noise detector adjusts the gain of the compensation to avoid the enhancement of the noise component. The shoot suppressor further adjusts the gain of the compensation to avoid shoot artifacts. The adjusted high frequency compensated video is added back to the input video. The pre-compensated video sequence is then passed through a video scaler to obtain the scaled video. As such, the sharpness of the scaled video is maintained or even enhanced.

Abstract: A super precision image processing system improves the precision of videos and images and eliminates the stage-like artifacts in the smoothly changing areas. In order to obtain higher precision content, the system segments the input image into connected segments and finds a local support for each pixel based on the segmentation result. The system then applies low-pass filtering to the local support for each pixel and the luminance changes between the filtering result and the original luminance of the pixel are limited to a level such that the output image will have the same higher bits as the input image.

Abstract: The present invention relates to a method for adjusting the saturation levels of the pixels of a time varying image being represented by RGB color sample vectors {right arrow over (C)} in an RGB color system. The method does not require the RGB color sample vectors {right arrow over (C)} to be converted into YUV samples in order to subsequently perform saturation adjustment.

Abstract: Disclosed is a healing enhancement apparatus formed from a curtain bearing a calming image such as an outdoor scene or other image of nature. The healing enhancement apparatus, an alternative to the sterile environment found in most hospitals, has therapeutic benefits. In particular, the calming image, occupying all or most of the curtain assists in calming the patient, reducing blood pressure, reducing required medications, and assists in quicker recoveries. The calming image may be applied to first and second panels of cloth that are stitched together, in registration, at a seam. The calming image may extend from edge-to-edge, or may occupy a framed portion of the curtain. The calming image may consists of an outdoor scene as viewed through one or more windows and, where the image contains two or more windows, the seam may be conveniently located within the image of the wall surface between adjacent windows.