Patents Assigned to Texas Instruments
  • Patent number: 4401904
    Abstract: A random access read/write MOS memory device or the like employs a delay circuit in clock generators to produce small increments of delay. The delay circuit consists of a field effect transistor connected as a transfer device with its gate precharged and the gate-to-source capacitance much larger than the parasitics of the gate node. A larger transistor may be connected to the output node to improve the output waveform by holding down the output voltage at the beginning of a cycle.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 24, 1980
    Date of Patent: August 30, 1983
    Assignee: Texas Instruments Incorporated
    Inventors: Lionel S. White, Jr., Ngai H. Hong
  • Patent number: 4400796
    Abstract: A temperature compensated, phase tolerant sense amplifier for use in a magnetic bubble memory system in which current is applied to the detector resistors only during a bubble detect operation.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 22, 1980
    Date of Patent: August 23, 1983
    Assignee: Texas Instruments Incorporated
    Inventors: Thomas A. Closson, David B. Oxford, Stephen R. Schenck, Jerold A. Seitchik
  • Patent number: 4400809
    Abstract: Disclosed is a method and apparatus for digital implementation and closed loop feedback of magnetic field waveforms utilizing three channels of a four channel incrementally programmable voltage source to drive field coils in each of three spatial axes, respectively. A fourth channel is utilized for signal conditioning of an output signal from a magnetic bubble memory undergoing test by injecting inverted noise to maximize the signal-to-noise ratio.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 2, 1981
    Date of Patent: August 23, 1983
    Assignee: Texas Instruments Incorporated
    Inventor: Robert J. Whitinger
  • Patent number: 4400677
    Abstract: A circuit breaker has a thermally responsive bimetallic member of substantial resistance properties disposed in the breaker circuit so that it self-heats and moves to trip a mechanism to open the breaker circuit after a selected period of time when a selected overload current occurs in the circuit. Conductors are joined by a thermally separable bond and are disposed in the breaker circuit in selected heat transfer relation to the high resistance bimetallic member to be thermally separated after a selected delay period by heat transferred to the bond from the bimetallic means, thereby to open the circuit in the event that movement of the thermally responsive member is ineffective to open the circuit. Spring means preferably bias the conductors to separate to assure circuit opening when thermal separation of the noted bond occurs. Preferably one of the conductors has a part of reduced cross-section adapted to rupture and open the circuit under alternate circuit conditions.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 9, 1981
    Date of Patent: August 23, 1983
    Assignee: Texas Instruments Incorporated
    Inventors: Carleton M. Cobb, III, Roland G. Morin, Hans G. Hirsbrunner
  • Patent number: 4399423
    Abstract: A miniature motor protector particularly suitable for low current applications has a generally rectangular parallelepiped configured metallic housing open at the top having a bottom wall and side walls extending upwardly therefrom, the side walls having a flange forming a ledge portion at their free ends extending around all four sides with at least two opposed flanges have an extended portion to permit them to be bent to clampingly engage an element received on the ledge. An electrically insulative gasket is disposed on the ledge with a plate-like element having a selected electrical resistance placed on top of the gasket. The extended flange portions are bent over the gasket and plate-like element to clampingly engage them. The plate-like element is formed with a first switch element mounting portion, a second heater portion and a third support portion adapted to engage the ledge on all four sides.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 29, 1982
    Date of Patent: August 16, 1983
    Assignee: Texas Instruments Incorporated
    Inventor: Joseph G. Nield
  • Patent number: 4399331
    Abstract: An electronic telephone including a keyboard input, a telephone line interface, a speech synthesis device with a control line and an audio line coupled to the telephone line interface, a message recorder with an audio line coupled to a telephone line interface, and an electronic digital processor system to control the device. The electronic digital processor system includes two independent and separably operable central processing units. One central processing unit is activated by the keyboard when a telephone number is input and may be used to store numerous, frequently called telephone numbers.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 13, 1981
    Date of Patent: August 16, 1983
    Assignee: Texas Instruments Incorporated
    Inventors: Sammy K. Brown, Duane Solimeno, Peter L. Koeppen, Gerald Rogers
  • Patent number: 4399517
    Abstract: An improved 6-input adder is disclosed. The adder decodes pairs of inputs to provide three sets of NAND, NOR and Exclusive OR terms which are inputted to AND-OR-INVERT arrays which generate first and second carry output terms of a 3-bit binary number in less than three gate delays.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 19, 1981
    Date of Patent: August 16, 1983
    Assignee: Texas Instruments Incorporated
    Inventors: Jeffrey A. Niehaus, Kevin M. Ovens
  • Patent number: 4398059
    Abstract: An electronic, speech producing system receives allophonic codes and produces speech-like sounds corresponding to these codes, through a loud speaker. A micro-controller controls the retrieval, from a read-only memory, of digital signals representative of individual allophone parameters. The addresses at which such allophone parameters are located are directly related to the allophonic code. A dedicated microcontroller concatenates the digital signals representative of the allophone parameters, including code indicating stress and intonation patterns for the allophones. The allophones are divided into a plurality of frames with one digital position indicating whether the frame is the last frame in the allophone, in which event an extra frame is introduced to provide smoothing between allophones when no stop is present and when the present allophone is voiced and the subsequent allophone is voiced, or when the present allophone is unvoiced and the subsequent allophone is unvoiced.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 5, 1981
    Date of Patent: August 9, 1983
    Assignee: Texas Instruments Incorporated
    Inventors: Kun-Shan Lin, Kathleen M. Goudie, Gene A. Frantz
  • Patent number: 4393834
    Abstract: A thermally responsive electrical switch for a fast idle control in an automotive engine has two thermally responsive snap acting discs disposed in an open-ended well in a thermally conducting housing. A switch means having contacts movable between open and closed circuit positions is disposed in the open end of the well and the discs are arranged to snap at respective first and second temperatures. Resilient conductors are mounted on the switch means and are electrically connected to the respective contacts. A terminal member which completes the low cost assembly is secured to the housing to press terminals of different selected types against the resilient conductors to electrically connect the terminals to the respective switch contacts and to resiliently hold the switch means in place in the housing.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 12, 1982
    Date of Patent: July 19, 1983
    Assignee: Texas Instruments Incorporated
    Inventor: John Doherty, Jr.
  • Patent number: 4393474
    Abstract: A fault tolerant memory device includes an array of rows and columns of dynamic random access memory cells and a set of EPROM cells of the floating gate type laid out with the same pitch, one aligned with each row, to store the identity of rows having bad cells. The EPROM cells are formed in preferred manner which permits them to be made with a standard N-channel process, and allows the row lines of the RAM and control gate connections to the EPROM cells to be of the same spacing.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 11, 1980
    Date of Patent: July 12, 1983
    Assignee: Texas Instruments Incorporated
    Inventor: David J. McElroy
  • Patent number: 4393475
    Abstract: A nonvolatile semiconductor memory device formed of a plurality of memory cells arranged in a matrix pattern includes a plurality of reference cells, a reference voltage supply, and differential type sensing amplifiers connected to output lines of the memory cells and to an output line of the reference cells. In one embodiment the storage capability of each memory cell is tested by comparing the cell voltage to the reference voltage by selectively connecting the reference cell output line with the sensing amplifier associated with the column containing the cell under test. A memory cell is determined to be defective when the difference between the cell voltage and the reference voltage, that is, the output of the differential sensing amplifier, is below a predetermined value.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: January 27, 1981
    Date of Patent: July 12, 1983
    Assignee: Texas Instruments Incorporated
    Inventors: Norihisa Kitagawa, Eisaburo Iwamoto
  • Patent number: 4393479
    Abstract: A non-volatile semiconductor integrated circuit has floating poly-silicon gates on the channel regions of memory cells. The information electronically stored in said floating gates is erased by the irradiation of an X-ray with predetermined amount. The writing step prior to X-ray irradiation causes the uniform erase of entire memory cells. The circuits other than memory cells are protected by a shielding coating against the X-ray irradiation.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 17, 1980
    Date of Patent: July 12, 1983
    Assignee: Texas Instruments Incorporated
    Inventors: Nguyen T. Du, Akihide Asao
  • Patent number: 4392608
    Abstract: A thermally responsive fluid and electrical switch particularly for use in an automotive engine control system has first and second housing means each with an open-ended well, the housing means being secured together so that the wells cooperate to form a switch chamber. Fluid ports and terminal apertures open into the second housing means, and terminals are mounted in the terminal apertures to extend into the chamber. Valve and contact means are disposed in the chamber. A thermally responsive snap acting disc is mounted in the chamber in heat-transfer relation to the thermally conducting first housing to move in response to selected temperature changes and motion transfer means move in the chamber with the disc for moving the valve means to regulate fluid flow between the ports and for moving the contact means to regulate the flow of electrical current between the terminals.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 3, 1979
    Date of Patent: July 12, 1983
    Assignee: Texas Instruments Incorporated
    Inventor: Brian J. Blades
  • Patent number: 4392893
    Abstract: The characteristics of integrated circuits, such as the gate threshold voltage (Vtx) of insulated gate field effect transistors, or the current amplification factor (h.sub.FE) of bipolar transistors are altered by the irradiation of the X-ray with predetermined amount.The X-ray irradiation is used to make the integrated circuits with very accurate characteristics with high yield of production. It is also used to make variety of sample information by changing the characteristics of the same device one after another.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 17, 1980
    Date of Patent: July 12, 1983
    Assignee: Texas Instruments Incorporated
    Inventors: Nguyen T. Du, Akihide Asao
  • Patent number: 4393289
    Abstract: A high performance, manually and automatically operable, trip-free magnetic circuit breaker incorporates a double break contact system to achieve longer life, more reliable operation and improved rupture capacity.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 6, 1979
    Date of Patent: July 12, 1983
    Assignee: Texas Instruments Incorporated
    Inventor: Aime J. Grenier
  • Patent number: 4390885
    Abstract: An apparatus having a reservoir for enclosing a fluid and a valve for selectively applying gas under pressure to said reservoir and venting said reservoir to the ambient air. A controller supplies a pulse of predetermined duration selected from a plurality of durations to actuate the valve to apply the gas under pressure to the reservoir for expelling a predetermined amount of ink therefrom through a tube by compensation for dynamic effects. The ink is transferred from one end of the tube to a selected item of a sheet of items by moving the end of the tube closely adjacent to the sheet while the ink is being expelled from the reservoir and through the tube for transfer to the individual item.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 26, 1981
    Date of Patent: June 28, 1983
    Assignee: Texas Instruments Incorporated
    Inventors: Gautam N. Shah, Michael R. Brown, Edward C. Lee, Gerald C. Hook, Robert L. Wand, Charles R. Ratliff, Virge W. McClure
  • Patent number: 4390874
    Abstract: A liquid crystal display system having improved temperature compensation using multiple capacitance ratios for different display temperature ranges. The capacitance of a liquid crystal display segment is measured when preconditioned to a first voltage below the threshold voltage and when preconditioned to a second voltage above the threshold voltage. Separate embodiments are disclosed which sequentially measure the capacitance of a single segment or which simultaneously measures the capacitance of two segments. The magnitude of the second voltage is adjusted to converge the ratio of the measured capacitances to a predetermined value selected according to the display temperature. The on segment and off segment voltages are then formed based on fixed percentages of this second voltage.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: January 9, 1981
    Date of Patent: June 28, 1983
    Assignee: Texas Instruments Incorporated
    Inventors: Robert H. Woodside, Michael J. Drury
  • Patent number: 4390392
    Abstract: In order to produce wafers suitable for fabrication of integrated circuits, an ingot of raw silicon must undergo a process which includes several steps. The ingot must be sawed into slices, the slices edge ground to remove roughness of the edges, lapped to remove as much saw damage as possible, stress relief etched to remove as small a damaged area as possible, then polished. Each of these steps requires removal of some of the material of the slice. The use of laser annealing reduces the amount of surface removed, as it repairs some surface damage, smoothes the surface, and when accomplished in a partial vacuum, improves the chemical composition of the material as related to electrical activity.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 16, 1980
    Date of Patent: June 28, 1983
    Assignee: Texas Instruments Incorporated
    Inventors: John T. Robinson, Olin B. Cecil, Rajiv R. Shah
  • Patent number: 4390971
    Abstract: An MOS read only memory or ROM is formed by a process compatible with standard N-channel silicon gate manufacturing methods. The ROM is programmed after the top level of contacts and interconnections, usually metal, has been deposited and patterned. Address lines and gates are polysilicon, and output and ground lines are defined by elongated N+ regions. Each potential MOS transistor in the array is programmed to be a logic "1" or "0" by ion implanting through the polysilicon gates and thin gate oxide, using patterned protective oxide as a mask, or using photoresist as a mask prior to application of protective oxide.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: July 20, 1981
    Date of Patent: June 28, 1983
    Assignee: Texas Instruments Incorporated
    Inventor: Chang-Kiang Kuo
  • Patent number: 4390970
    Abstract: A storage register which may be used to store several sets of data. The storage register may also be used as a demultiplexer to separate two or more sets of data that were received by the register over a single data line. The storage register includes a closed circuit loop of pairs of field effect devices and pairs of clocking devices wherein the clocking devices are coupled between the field effect devices. Input and output terminals are coupled to selected field effect devices. Embodiments of this storage register permit several bits of information to be stored simultaneously in the closed circuit loop and still remain accessible to input and output terminals at different times controlled by the clocking means. A further embodiment provides for several closed circuit loops to be arranged for the parallel storage of data bits.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 15, 1980
    Date of Patent: June 28, 1983
    Assignee: Texas Instruments Incorporated
    Inventor: Brian Kay