Abstract: A device for collecting biological material, characterized in that it comprises a rod having, at one end, a dry absorbent body having a surface area of between approximately 1 and approximately 3.14 mm2, said absorbent body comprising surfactants and denaturing agents. The present invention also relates to the use of said device for sampling biological material from a biological trace having any surface area greater than a micro surface area of around 1 mm2 or having any volume greater than a micro-volume of around 1 microliter, and to a method for collecting biological material and a method for collecting and analyzing and/or identifying biological material, comprising a step of putting said device in contact with said biological material.

Abstract: A device for connecting high-voltage cables, the device including primary and secondary enclosing insulators, the primary enclosing insulator for mounting on a primary inner conductor of a first cable and the secondary enclosing insulator for mounting on a secondary inner conductor of a second cable, an electric hookup element, a plurality of each of primary and secondary shielding extensions, and a plurality of compressed electric insulators. The electric hookup element is for connecting two such inner conductors, the primary shielding extensions are for enclosing the primary enclosing insulator, and the secondary shielding extensions are for enclosing the secondary enclosing insulator. The primary and secondary shielding extensions are capable of being made integral with each other, and such primary and secondary inner conductors and the electric hookup element are electrically insulated from the primary and secondary shielding extensions by the compressed electric insulators.

Abstract: The invention relates to a wall feedthrough, in particular for a metal wall and for a high-voltage coaxial cable, said feedthrough comprising an insulating socket which is affixed to the wall and which includes a central segment, an upstream end and a downstream end, said ends each projecting on its side from the wall. The insulating socket allows passing a cable inner conductor through it, and the feedthrough furthermore includes primary mechanical fasteners at the downstream socket end which cooperate with secondary mechanical fasteners affixed to the sheathed part of the cable. This feedthrough is characterized in that the cable's inner conductor is electrically insulated from the wall by pre-stressed electric insulators.

Abstract: A triboelectric device includes a voltage source, a polarizing amplifier, and electrodes to apply a polarizing voltage to a first material of the device. The electrodes are not fixed to the first material, allowing relative rubbing displacement between the electrodes and the first material. Preferably, a conductive second material, such as petrolatum, is provided between the first material and the electrodes. Such a device can have its properties change while in service. To accommodate this, the voltage source preferably provides an adjustable polarization voltage. The triboelectric device is useful as a transducer, and particularly useful as a hydrophone used in sonar antenna, as its mode type can be changed in the field during service to correct spurious signals or interferring noises.

Abstract: A piezosensitive device includes a material and a device that applies a polarizing voltage to the material. Embodiments of the material are piezosensitive only when a polarizing voltage is applied to them. The device can be used, for example, in electromechanical transducers of sonar antennas.

Abstract: The invention concerns the field of focusing and aiming instruments and more particularly a device for determining the direction of a target in a predetermined index mark comprising a focusing element, a resetting device for resetting the focusing element and a device for processing signals derived from the focusing element, the processing device determining values representing the direction between the focusing element and the target and transmitting the values to a display or an external system. The device is characterized in that the focusing element has a focusing member of three gyrometers arranged along three axes substantially perpendicular to one another and a controller that controls the transmission of the values representing the direction between the focusing element and the target to the display or to the external system.

Abstract: A boron and silicon oxynitride obtained by preparing a polyborosiloxane precursor, conducting nitriding pyrolysis of the precursor to obtain an amorphous boron and silicon oxynitride, and optionally conducting additional pyrolysis to obtain a crystallized boron and silicon oxynitride. The polyborosiloxane precursor is prepared by condensation, in the presence of a catalyst, of (2) a polychlorosilane represented by the formula R3R4SiCl2 in which the substituents R3 and R4 are identical or different and each represents a hydrogen atom, a chlorine atom, a linear or branched alkyl or alkenyl or alkynyl radical having 5 or less carbon atoms, or an aryl or aralkyl radical having 6 to 18 carbon atoms, with (2) an alkyl borate represented by the formula (R5O)3B in which R5 represents a linear or branched alkyl radical having 1 to 5 carbon atoms.

Abstract: A subsea thermoelectric generator has a plurality of flat thermoelectric modules attached concentrically to the outside wall of an undersea line in which petroleum products extracted from a subsea drilling well circulate. The thermoelectric modules are disposed in flat-bottomed pans machined into the outside wall of the line. The pans are sealed by lids made of heat-conducting material and in thermal contact with the thermoelectric modules. Each lid defines, with the walls of the corresponding pan, a peripheral sealed chamber. The various chambers in the pans communicate with each other through passages provided in partitions that separate the pans and are filled with a soft (compliant), preferably non-heat-conducting, resin. At least one of the pans is provided with an orifice closed by a sealed deformable element.

Abstract: According to the process of the invention, sets of restriction fragments from the DNA of an individual are prepared, these restriction fragments being separated by size. Probes are prepared by enzymatic hydrolysis of DNA from a genome bank of the species to which this individual belongs, separation of the fragments obtained as a function of their size, labeling these probes and placing them in contact, under hybridization conditions, with the aforementioned sets of restriction fragments. Finally, selection is made of the probes (capable of hybridizing with said set of restriction fragments) which do not give hybridization profiles identical to those obtained with known probes recognizing variable number tandem repeat regions. Applications for the probes thus obtained include, particularly, processes for identifying an individual, consanguinity testing, and investigating the origin of a seed.

Abstract: The present invention relates to a multilayer material useful as an anti-erosion and anti-abrasion coating, and to a process for producing the multilayer material at low temperatures. The multilayer material comprises a substrate covered with at least one metallic tungsten ductile layer and at least one hard layer of a solid solution of an additional element chosen from carbon or nitrogen or a mixture of carbon and nitrogen in tungsten or a tungsten alloy, the two types of layers ar alternating. The multilayer material is particularly useful as a coating for parts used in aeronautics.

Abstract: The invention is directed to the class of submersible electro-acoustic transducers such as double "Tonpilz" transducers, wherein it is desirable to reduce the resonant frequency of the transducers while maintaining a given output power emitted by the transducers. The transducer according to the invention includes at least one horn solid with the end of a motor pillar, a hollow rigid box surrounding the horn and delimiting with the horn a cavity. The cavity communicates via a port with an external fluid, and has determined dimensions and external volume. The transducer further includes a passive radiator made of a material denser than the external fluid. The radiator obturates the port and hangs at a periphery of the port by an elastic material.

Abstract: The present invention relates to a process and transducer for emitting wide and and low frequency acoustic waves in unlimited immersion depth.The invention is applied to tranducers comprising at least one electro-acoustic motor (1) causing any wall 3 of the said waves to vibrate, and a hollow shell 5 enclosing the said motor 1, and delimiting with the said vibrating wall 3 among others, a cavity 7, characterised in that:at least one opening 5, causing cavity 7 to communicate with ambient medium 4, is made in said shell 5;in at least part of the volume of the said cavity 7, at least one flexible bladder 7, is installed;this bladder 8 is filled with a fluid 9 more compressible than fluid 4.

Abstract: A container is intended for containing a lightweight torpedo type weapon to e launched from a surface craft. The weapon includes activation structure for the batteries supplying energy to the weapon, an extraction device of the activation safety device when the weapon is launched, and a remote control connection to supply the programming of the weapon commands before it is launched. These three features are interdependent with the container, which is brought to the launching position with the weapon held in a storage position. The activation of the activation structure for the batteries and extraction device of the activation safety device, as well as the disconnection of the remote control connection, take place automatically when the weapon is launched.

Abstract: A transducer includes one or more electro-acoustic motors located on a same internal plane or as a peripheral ring of a flexible envelope to which they are interdependent by at least one-of their ends by an assembling device and to which they transmit their vibrations, the flexible envelope being in contact with the liquid and constituting the acoustic waves emitting surface. The flexible envelope is shaped such that the amplitude of the vibrations is increased in a range of very low frequency. The envelope includes at least one orifice allowing the liquid to enter the whole internal cavity delimited by the envelope and a baffle made up of alveolar material that resists the immersion pressure and fills most of the cavity volume. The external surface of the baffle is at a constant distance from that of the interior of the envelope and is interdependent to the assembling device of the acoustic motors.

Abstract: A real time passive trajectography device comprises at least three pairs of ensors. Each pair of sensers is separated from the other pairs of sensors by a distance which is greater than the distance separating each of the sensors of the pair. One of the pairs of sensors is roughly aligned with the currently determined trajectory while other pairs of the sensors are aligned at 0.degree. to 30.degree. from the perpendicular to the current trajectory. Of each pair of sensors, the output signal from a first sensor is used as a reference signal. The output signal from a second sensor is compared to the output signal of the first signal based on a presumed speed of the object being tracked. The presumed speed is continually updated until a maximum correlation between the first and second output signals is obtained. The measurement and correlation operation is repeated at predetermined intervals, with the initial presumed speed extrapolated from the trajectory previously computed during previous intervals.

Abstract: The invention relates to processes and electro-acoustic transducers for transmitting low-frequency acoustic waves in a liquid. An electro-acoustic transducer according to the invention is a transducer of the double-tonpilz type, comprising two electro-acoustic drivers (1a, 1b) in line on both sides with a central counter-mass (2) and between two horns (3a, 3b). This mechanical assembly is located in a rigid box (4) which is fitted with side holes (5) and which delimits a cavity (7) housing elastic tubes (6) closed at their both ends and filled with gas so that the Helmholtz resonant frequency of the cavity (7) is close and preferably lower than the fundamental frequency of the axial vibrations of the vibrating assembly. An application of the invention is the construction of low-frequency transmitting transducers of the double-tonpilz type with a wide pass-band.

Abstract: A composite material the characteristics of which can be modulated by preimpregnation of a continuous fiber.It is characterized in that it is comprised of a sheath and a core consisting of continuous fibers, a powder and a filler the melting temperature of which is higher than at least the highest melting temperature of the other constituents of the material.Applicable notably in the radioelectric fields and to radomes in particular.

Abstract: A Bloch line magnetic memory has a magnetic film of thickness h located on a substrate and includes Bloch lines of width .LAMBDA.o. The magnetic film satisfies the condition (1) h/.LAMBDA.o<14 with .LAMBDA.o=.sqroot.A/2.pi.Ms.sup.2, in which A represents the magnetic exchange constant and 4.pi.Ms represents the saturation magnetization of the film.

Abstract: Disclosed is a new antenna structure having a quasi-hemispherical radiation pattern and capable of having a relatively wide passband, so that it is possible to define two neighboring transmission sub-bands therein or, again, a single wide transmission band. The antenna is of the type comprising a quadrifilar helix (11) formed by two bifilar helices (11.sub.1, 11.sub.2, 11.sub.3, 11.sub.4) positioned orthogonally and excited in phase quadrature, and including at least one second quadrifilar helix that is coaxial and electromagnetically coupled with said first quadrifilar helix (11). Preferred application to L band communications among geostationary satellites or transiting satellites with moving bodies fitted out with such antennas.

Abstract: Method for obtaining an organic polycrystalline material having in particular electro-optical properties, said material obtained and an electro-optical modulator comprising said material. This method includes a stage (1) for preparing a powder having a size grading of 500 to 800 nm of an organic compound having a delocalized system of .pi. electrons and presenting a non-centrosymmetrical crystalline structure, as well as intramolecular load transfer groupings, a stage (2) for drying the powder under vacuum, a stage (3) for pre-pressing the powder under vacuum, and a hot stage (5) for the uniaxial compression of the dried powder under vacuum. This method enables polycrystalline materials to be obtained, said materials comprising elongated monocrystalline grains orientated according to a given direction.