Abstract: An embodiment of the present invention provides a marker, a test method, and a test kit which can detect the onset of breast cancer that cannot be detected by palpation or mammography examination or breast cancer in an early stage (clinical stage 0), which are simple, and which have high reliability. A marker associated with breast cancer of an embodiment of the present invention is characterized by being a micro-RNA that is found in serum or plasma. More specifically, the marker contains at least a micro-RNA that is present in the serum or the plasma at a significantly reduced level after the onset of breast cancer, or during or after an early stage (during or after clinical stage 0) of breast cancer compared with that before the onset of breast cancer or before the early stage (before clinical stage 0) of breast cancer.

Abstract: Provided is a system including a first image forming apparatus and an information processing apparatus connected via a network. When a second image forming apparatus is added to the network, the second image forming apparatus generates parent setting information indicating that the first image forming apparatus previously connected to the network is its parent, and transmits the parent setting information to the first image forming apparatus. The first image forming apparatus generates parent-child relationship setting information indicating a parent-child relationship between the first image forming apparatus and the second image forming apparatus, based on the parent setting information from the second image foaming apparatus. The information processing apparatus registers the second image forming apparatus as a new output destination, based on information of the second image forming apparatus.

Abstract: An optical film characterized by a high degree of flatness that can be used as a phase difference film of a liquid crystal display, and a method for manufacturing this optical film according to melt-casting film forming method. A melt including a cellulose resin is extruded onto a rotary support member 5 (cooling roll) from a flow casting die 4. A rotary pinch member 6 (touch roll) is energized to the rotary support member 5, and a nip is formed between them. When the melt is sandwiched and pressed by the nip, a die line and irregularity in thickness are removed. The linear pressure of the rotary pinch member 6 and the temperature of the melt immediately before the melt is sandwiched and pressed by the nip are set within a predetermined range, whereby effective correction of the film flatness is achieved.

Abstract: A method of enabling host devices having an IPsec policy to communicate with one another via an IPv6 communication network, which includes the following steps: extracting a Media Access Control identifier (MAC ID) for a target host from a security policy for an IPv6 address for the target host; searching for the MAC ID of the target host in an Address Resolution Protocol (ARP) table on a source host; upon locating the MAC ID of the target host, creating a temporal neighbor cache entry in a neighbor cache table for the target host; and enabling a security association between the source host and the target host based on the temporal neighbor entry in the neighbor cache table, which allows IPv6 communications to be exchanged between the target host and the source host.

Abstract: An image forming apparatus comprises a fixing part for fixing a toner image formed on a transfer material to the transfer material, a fan provided on the downstream side of the fixing part, for blowing air to the transfer material having passed through the fixing part, and an airflow control part for controlling the amount of air to be blown from the fan. When the basis weight of the transfer material is larger than a first threshold value, the airflow control part sets the amount of air to be blown to a value smaller than that in a case where the basis weight of the transfer material is smaller than the first threshold value.

Abstract: A heat generating roller which generates a heat when magnetic flux is applied from outside, which has high ability to control an amount of heat generation of itself and which has sufficient strength, including a main heating layer made of a material having a low electric resistivity, a heat controlling layer made of magnetic metal including at least nickel, a heat insulation layer having a low heat conductivity, and a stiff metal core, in order as above from outside, wherein the heat controlling layer is annealed, and the heat controlling layer and the heat insulation layer are bonded to each other.

Abstract: A drive device includes a setting unit 12 for setting a control value using a control value-displacement characteristic at a predetermined reference temperature showing a relationship between a control value used to position a movable unit 5 and a displacement of the movable unit 5; a drive unit 20 for supplying drive power corresponding to the control value set by the setting unit 12 to a shape-memory alloy 1 and causing the shape-memory alloy 1 to expand or contract, thereby positioning the movable unit 5; and a correction unit 13 for correcting the control value so as to correct a position shift of the movable unit 5 from a target position resulting from a difference between a control value-displacement characteristic at an ambient temperature and a control value-displacement characteristic at the reference temperature based on the ambient temperature detected by a temperature detection unit 11.

Abstract: The present invention provides an actinic energy radiation curable ink-jet ink exhibiting excellent ink storage stability, nozzle ink repellency, and ejection stability, and also exhibiting excellent curability, anti-abrasion properties, solvent resistance, flexibility, weather resistance, and substrate adhesion properties even under various ambience factors and irradiation conditions, as well as an ink-jet recording method and printed matter using the same. In an actinic energy radiation curable ink-jet ink containing a cationically polymerizable compound and a photo-cationic polymerization initiator, an actinic energy radiation curable ink-jet ink wherein a cationically polymerizable compound having a vinyl ether group as a reactive group is contained at 50.0% by mass or more and the halogen ion content is 1.0 ?g/g of the ink-100 ?g/g of the ink.

Abstract: An image forming method including: inputting a pulse width modulated signal into a laser beam output section and thereby outputting a laser beam, wherein a pulse width of the pulse width modulated signal is changed based on image data containing density information; scanning the laser beam onto a surface of a photoreceptor through an optical scanning apparatus and thereby outputting an image; detecting a diameter of the laser beam in a sub-scanning direction formed on the surface of the photoreceptor, the diameter of the laser beam inherent to each optical scanning apparatus and changing along an image height in a main scanning direction; and correcting the pulse width in response to the diameter in the sub-scanning direction so that the image output density is uniform with respect to one and the same input density in the image data.

Abstract: Provided is a toner for an electrostatic charge image development having toner particles which contain: a binder resin; a colorant; and a compound represented by Formula (1) in an amount of 0.1 to 65 ppm based on the total weight of the toner particles: wherein R1 and R2 each respectively represents a hydrogen atom, an alkyl group having 1 to 4 carbon atoms, or an aryl group.

Abstract: An image processing apparatus includes a smoothing processing unit which performs smoothing processing, a thinning processing unit which performs thinning processing, an edge direction determination unit which determines an edge direction with respect to each pixel of the image data and a blending processing unit which decides a pixel value of each pixel of when the thinning processing and the smoothing processing are realized at same time. In the image processing apparatus, the blending processing unit decides a pixel value of a target pixel of when the thinning processing and the smoothing processing are realized at the same time depending on a combination of whether the thinning processing is performed or not and whether the smoothing processing is performed or not on the target pixel.

Abstract: A method for processing a high dynamic range (HDR) image for printing. Tone mapping is first applied to the input image to map the colors, to find an optimized range of brightness values, and to scale the color to place colors inside the optimized range (in-range colors) into a device color space (e.g. sRGB), but without clipping colors outside of the optimized range (out-of-range colors). The scaled colors are then converted to the color space of the output device (e.g. CMYK) using WCS (Windows Color System) color transform, where the in-range colors are processed using a optimized transform and the out-of-range are processed using a sequential transform. A mapping from the original color space to the converted color space for all colors in the image is stored in a lookup table (LUT), and the input image is converted to the output image using the LUT.

Abstract: An image pickup lens has a configuration of five lenses whose aberrations are corrected favorably despite its compactness compared to a conventional type.

Abstract: A toner used for electrostatic latent image development which is excellent in fixing separability with maintaining sufficient low temperature fixability even in a high-speed machine and is also superior in crashing resistance, comprising toner particles, each comprising a core particle and a shell layer provided on the surface of the core particle, wherein the core particle comprises a binder resin containing a styrene-acrylic resin and a first styrene-acrylic modified polyester, and the shell comprises a second styrene-acrylic modified polyester resin.

Abstract: A method of determining print media attributes of print media, which includes the following steps: obtaining information from a package of print media using an image recognition system associated with the image forming apparatus; sending the information via a network connection to at least one print media database server for determination of print media attributes for the package of print media; determining the print media attributes of the package of print media by matching the information obtained from the image recognition system to a print attribute database hosted by the at least one print media database server, the print attribute database containing print media attributes for a plurality of print mediums, which are available to a plurality of image forming apparatuses; and sending the print media attributes for the package of print media to the image forming apparatus, which generates printer configuration settings for the print media.

Abstract: An image forming system comprising: a controller, provided with a list creation means to create a display list by analyzing PDL data decompression means to decompress compressed image data, a drawing means to execute drawing based on the image data, and a print data creation means to create the print data based on the image data for sending the print data to a printer; and a rasterization accelerator, provided with a second drawing means to execute drawing processing based on the display list, and a compression means to compress the image data drawn by the second drawing unit, for sending the image data to the controller, wherein the rasterization accelerator comprises determination means for determining, based on the information of the display list, whether to execute or not the compression of the image data, and a compression method in case of executing the compression.

Abstract: An image forming apparatus includes: a transfer member, a controller, a discharge electrode, a detector, and a storage section. The controller, based on an amount of change between parameter value detected by the detector after transfer by the transfer member and parameter value stored in the storage section, determines voltage necessary for the discharge electrode to take the same amount of current as an increase in transfer current of the transfer member from previously determined transfer current and applies the determined voltage to the discharge electrode.

Abstract: A system and program implement a process for allowing users of third party vendors to access print shop applications without separate authentication. The process includes the steps of creating a query-string having identification information of a third party vendor and authentication information of a user of the third party vendor. The query-string is created in response to the user's access to the third party vendor's web-site, and is contained in an inline frame and encrypted. Upon receiving the encrypted query-string sent from a third party vendor server to a print shop server, the query-string is decrypted. It is then determined whether the user has an existing account on the print shop server. If the user has an existing account, the user is automatically logged into the print shop server so that the user may access and use any print-on-demand applications on the print shop server without manually inputting user authentication information on the print shop server.

Abstract: A method of detecting and displaying network status for an image forming system having an image forming apparatus and a printer controller. The method includes the steps of connecting the printer controller with the image forming apparatus through a first line which a client sends a print job to the printer controller and a second line which transfers the image data. Upon detection of a failure in network connectivity through the first line, transmitting messages from the printer controller and image forming apparatus to the printer controller and the image forming apparatus. The messages sent and received by the printer controller and the image forming apparatus are gathered and based on the gathered messages received and not received by the image forming apparatus and the printer controller, a cause of the failure is detected.