Abstract: The first feature of the present invention resides in that in a method of semiconductor crystallization, comprising a characteristic determining step of applying first crystallizing energy to a predetermined area of an amorphous semiconductor thin film to determine the size of an area so as to form a single crystal nucleus on the area; and a polycrystalline semiconductor thin film forming step of forming a polycrystalline semiconductor thin film from the amorphous semiconductor thin film, the polycrystalline semiconductor thin film forming step, comprises: a film forming step of forming an amorphous semiconductor thin film on the surface of a substrate; a first crystallizing step of applying first crystallizing energy at regular intervals on the area having the size determined by the characteristic determining step of the amorphous semiconductor thin film; and a second crystallizing step of applying second crystallizing energy to the amorphous semiconductor thin film to grow the crystal of the amorphous semic

Abstract: Binary digital data is rendered on a surface, such as a sheet of paper, by printing a series of color patches on the sheet, with the 1 bits rendered as color patches of a first color and the 0 bits rendered as color patches of the second color. The color patches are arranged in a predetermined order along an axis on the surface. The second color relates to the first color by a fixed relationship in color space, whereby the absolute values of the first and second colors are immaterial to a detecting apparatus. The color patches can be intermixed with areas of a third color, the third color representing an average in color space of the first color and the second color.

Abstract: A method including: (a) positioning a hollow substrate having a first end and an open second end in a solution, wherein the substrate is held by a chuck assembly and the open second end is submerged in the solution, wherein gas is present in the hollow portion of the substrate between the solution and the chuck assembly, thereby defining a quantity of trapped gas molecules; (b) removing the substrate from the solution; and (c) changing the quantity of the trapped gas molecules by (i) withdrawing a portion of the trapped gas molecules, or (ii) introducing additional gas molecules into the hollow portion, wherein (i) and (ii) are accomplished through the first end of the substrate, thereby controlling the pressure of the gas in the hollow portion.

Abstract: Photoconductive imaging members comprised of unsymmetrical dimeric perylene as a charge generator, wherein said perylene is of the following formula ##STR1## wherein R is hydrogen, alkyl, cycloalkyl, substituted alkyl, aryl, substituted aryl, aralkyl or substituted aralkyl group, and X-Y is an unsymmetrical bridging moiety of alkylene, substituted alkylene, arylene, substituted arylene, aralkylene or substituted aralkylene.

Abstract: A shaft assembly comprising an elongated member having at least a portion which is hollow, tubular, shell like having an inside surface defining a shaft core and an outside surface defining a shaft functional surface, the shaft core being filled with a hardened, moldable material, and the shaft functional surface having at least one functional feature thereon, which is of hardened, moldable material integrally molded with the hardened, moldable material in the shaft core. In a preferred embodiment the shaft assembly is rotatable and has at least one molding aperture gate extending through the shaft from the inside surface to the outside surface which is filled with hardened, moldable material which connects the hardened material in the shaft core and functional feature.

Abstract: A multi-level hierarchical bus architecture implemented with a multi-chip package and a modular shared-bus provides high bandwidth. All IC components are mounted on standardized multi-chip packages. Each multi-chip package includes bus interface chips for providing communication from the integrated circuits to a board bus. One multi-chip package contains additional bus interface circuitry for providing communication from the board bus to a backplane bus.

Abstract: In an optical communication network in which a plural number of nodes are connected to each bidirectional broadcasting bus, and a node communicates with another using the packets, or an optical communication network in which a plural number of nodes are connected to a bidirectional broadcasting bus, and a node communicates with another using the packets, each node comprises carrier sensing means for sensing a carrier on the broadcasting bus, and jamming detecting means for detecting a jamming state of received signals.

Abstract: A carrier comprised of a core with a coating thereover comprised of at least one polymer resin and wherein the outer surface of the coated carrier is fibrillated.

Abstract: The present invention provides a facsimile apparatus having a file transfer function which transmits and/or receiving file data utilizing one of a plurality of standardized file transfer modes. An interface connects a facsimile device to an external machine which processes file data transferred from the facsimile device. A determination is made as to whether the external machine connected to the interface is operable. File data is transmitted to the external machine for processing provided the external machine is determined to be operable.

Abstract: A process comprising:(i) preparing a pigment dispersion, which dispersion is comprised of a pigment, a cationic surfactant, and optionally a charge control agent;(ii) shearing said pigment dispersion with a latex comprised of water, resin, a counterionic or anionic surfactant with a charge polarity of opposite sign to that of said cationic surfactant, and a nonionic surfactant, and wherein said latex is prepared by the addition of monomers containing a chain transfer agent and a organic soluble initiator to a water phase containing a anionic surfactant, and said nonionic surfactant, followed by the addition of a water soluble initiator, and subsequently heating;(iii) heating the above sheared blend below about the glass transition temperature (Tg) of the resin to form electrostatically bound toner size aggregates; and(iv) heating said bound aggregates above about the Tg of the resin.

Abstract: An adjustable skew offset device includes a tapered roll as a paper drive roll and a line contact idler roll which is axially adjustable. With these two rolls forming a nip, paper passing therethrough can be purposely skewed clockwise or counterclockwise and thereby serving either to compensate for any fixed skew offset in the paper path or to null out any skew offset between small and large size papers.

Abstract: To create a latent electrostatic gray scale image on a charge receptor, a gray scale generator determines a charge distribution for a unit cell having at least two pixels. A charge manager then determines the amount of charge to be placed in each pixel. More specifically, the charge amount for a first ON pixel in the unit cell is assigned a relative full charge amount. The charge amount in each succeeding ON pixel is determined such as to ensure faithful reproduction of gray scale for any given ratio of pixel size to charge receptor thickness. To increase the developability in proportion to the gray scale, the charge manager manages the charge amount of succeeding ON pixels to be a smaller amount than the first ON pixel.

Abstract: When a status transition occurs, case data are collected and a new control rule is generated based on those case data. A control rule memory can store a plurality of control rules. A plurality of control rules are selectively read out from the control rule memory, and combined in accordance with their adaptabilities into an application control rule. An error between a target value and a measured control quantity is applied to the application control rule, to thereby calculate a correction value of an operation quantity. An operation part of an image forming apparatus main body is controlled based on the correction value so that the control quantity becomes the target value.

Abstract: An arbitrating apparatus, having a filtering circuit operatively coupled with a bus grant circuit, is provided. In one example of operation, a plurality of bus request signals are transmitted simultaneously to the filtering circuit. The filtering circuit permits one of the bus request signals to pass to the bus grant circuit where the passed bus request signal is matched with a bus grant signal, which bus grant signal is used to obtain access to a video bus for one of a plurality of bus masters.

Abstract: The outer circumferential portions of the opposite ends of a cylindrical photosensitive body provided with a photosensitive layer on a substrate is supported while the photosensitive body is driven. The rotation of the photosensitive body is controlled by control members which are a roll member, a tracking roll, an electrification roll member or the like. The substrate may be shaped into a cylinder by rolling up a metal strip or a metal plate and TIG-welding a joint portion thereof.

Abstract: Apparatus for dip coating comprising a drum having an outer surface to be coated, an upper end and a lower end, at least one coating vessel having a bottom, an open top and a cylindrically shaped vertical interior wall having a diameter greater than the diameter of the drum, an inlet at the bottom of the vessel, the inlet adapted to feed flowing coating fluid into the vessel, a mandrel adapted to maintain the outer surface of the drum in a concentric relationship with the vertical interior wall of the cylindrical coating vessel while the drum is immersed in the flowing coating material, the outer surface of the drum being radially spaced from the vertical interior wall of the cylindrical coating vessel, and at least one flow regulating member adapted to maintain laminar flow motion of the coating material as the fluid passes between the outer surface of the drum and the vertical inner wall of the vessel.

Abstract: A reservoir for dipping a non-cylindrical flexible belt into a coating fluid so that an electrophotographic layer can be deposited onto its outer surface during a manufacturing process includes a non-cylindrical tank with an inlet located at one end. A coating fluid enters the bottom of the tank and moves past a flow divider located inside or just above the inlet. This divides the entering fluid into two substantially equal portions, so that the level of coating fluid inside of the tank rises uniformly. The coating fluid passes first through a porous membrane, and then through a perforated plate, both of which will reduce the velocity of the coating fluid, to ensure that the fluid has laminar flow characteristics once it reaches the top of the reservoir. Finally, the coating fluid passes through an annular shaped flow director which ensures that the layer which is deposited onto the outer surface of the flexible belt has a uniform thickness.

Abstract: The present invention involves a novel form and methods for creating and using such forms. These forms are summaries (hereinafter "document surrogates") of associated objects, such as original documents, processes, or their copies, stored in a document processing system. A document surrogate made in accordance with the principles of the present invention comprises at least one sheet of a information storing substrate material that has a human readable area and a machine readable area. The human readable area may contain at least one area of material which summarizes the associated object. Such a summary may either be made manually by the user or created automatically by the document processing system. The machine readable area comprises a document reference code that is readable and recognizable by the document processing system. The code is located by the system and recognized from an image of the entire page. The reference code encodes an indicator to the storage location of the associated object.

Abstract: An electrophotographic imaging member including a substrate, a charge generating layer and a charge transport layer, the charge generating layer comprising photoconductive hydroxygallium phthalocyanine particles dispersed in a polymer matrix, the matrix comprising a polymeric film forming reaction product of at least vinyl chloride, vinyl acetate and hydroxyalkyl acrylate.

Abstract: A flexible electrophotographic imaging member including a supporting substrate and a resilient combination of at least one photoconductive layer and an overcoating layer, the at least one photoconductive layer comprising a hole transporting arylamine siloxane polymer and the overcoating comprising a crosslinked polyamide doped with a dihydroxy amine. This imaging member may be utilized in an imaging process including forming an electrostatic latent image on the imaging member, depositing toner particles on the imaging member in conformance with the latent image to form a toner image, and transferring the toner image to a receiving member.