Abstract: Personal care products useful for the maintenance of personal appearance and good health and minor treatments that do not require professional health care, as well as products that provide a combination of anti-microbial, anti-oxidant, anti-inflammatory, and anti-aging properties and are suitable for use without a prescription. The products utilize a biomembrane permeable organosulfur compound that can redox cycle between thiol, disulfide, and thiosulfinate forms in response to oxidants and antioxidants inside and outside of cells. Example products include an anti-microbial toothpaste with anti-plaque properties, an anti-inflammatory skin lotion with antioxidant, antimicrobial, and deodorant properties, and an anti-toxin skin lotion with anti-arsenicosis properties.

Abstract: S-allylmercapto-N-acetylcysteine and related compounds are disclosed which can be administered in order to provide protection from the formation of aldehyde-protein adducts, protein carbonylation, protein aggregation, and the resulting neuroinflammation. Various neurodegenerative diseases which are suitable for treatment using these compounds include Alzheimer's disease, senile dementia, Parkinson's disease, multiple sclerosis, Lewy body disease, peripheral neuropathy, spinal cord injury, stroke and cerebral ischemia.

Abstract: A method for enhancing the overall beneficial immune system response in a host that works in conjunction with the host's natural immune system response to enhance the host's ability to eliminate infectious microbes while simultaneously suppressing the toxicity of the immune system response to the host. Allium related organosulfur compounds are disclosed which have a various antimicrobial immunomodulatory properties that work together with the host's immune system in the prevention and treatment of disease. Prophylactic and therapeutic treatment is provided by administering an allium related organosulfur compound such that a localized thiosulfinate is caused to be non-enzymatically formed in response to localized generation by activated immune system cells of reactive oxygen species such as hydrogen peroxide. Suitable allium related organosulfur compounds may be administered to the host in an efficient manner through the use of S-AllylMercapto-N-AcetylCysteine (SAMNAC) or similar prodrugs.

Abstract: A method for enhancing the overall beneficial immune system response in a host that works in conjunction with the host's natural immune system response to simultaneously enhance the host's ability to eliminate infectious microbes while suppressing the toxicity of the immune system response to the host. Allium related organosulfur compounds have a variety of antimicrobial and immunomodulatory properties that work together with the host's immune system in the prevention and treatment of disease. Prophylactic and therapeutic treatment is provided by administering an allium related organosulfur compound such that a localized thiosulfinate is caused to be formed in response to localized generation of reactive oxygen species such as hydrogen peroxide by the activated immune system cells. Allium related organosulfur compounds may be administered to the host in an efficient manner through the use of protein-bound S-AllylMercaptoCysteine or similar prodrugs.

Abstract: Nutraceutical and dietary supplement formulations for delivering bioavailable thiols to a host, comprising certain organosulfur radicals, such as the allyl mercapto radical, bound to larger molecules such as proteins, resulting in the formation in the host's body of various allium-related compounds such as allicin. The formulations are produced by treating an ingestible material comprising a cysteine-containing protein with a thiol, disulfide, mixed disulfide, thiosufinate or mixed thiosulfinate so as to cause thiol residues to become disulfide bonded to cysteines contained in the protein.

Abstract: A method for increasing the bioavailability of cysteine within an animal by reducing extracellular cysteine disulfide molecules to produce extracellular cysteine molecules. A membrane permeable thiol molecule that forms a membrane permeable disulfide molecule after becoming oxidized participates in thiol-disulfide exchange reactions on both sides of the cellular membrane, crossing the membrane randomly via simple diffusion. The membrane permeable disulfide, within or upon entering the highly reductive environment of a cell, becomes reduced to form a membrane permeable thiol molecule. the membrane permeable thiol can then diffuse to the exterior of the cell, where it is available to reduce another cystine molecule. This process can continue cycling, producing net cumulative increase in the concentration of extracellular cysteine. This is beneficial for providing cysteine as a nutrient to cells that require cysteine for nourishment.

Abstract: A method for enhancing the overall beneficial immune system response in a host that works in conjunction with the host's natural immune system response to simultaneously enhance the host's ability to eliminate infectious microbes while suppressing the toxicity of the immune system response to the host. The method utilizes the non-enzymatic formation of allicin in response to the localized generation of H2O2 by immune system cells (such as neutrophils) to simultaneously increase the antimicrobial effect while reducing the cytotoxicity to the host. It is shown that enzymes can be reversibly inhibited that would not normally be sensitive to deactivation by a thiol-disulfide exchange reaction. This results in part from the recognition that deactivation of SH dependant enzymes by allicin does not take place by the previously attributed mechanism of thiol-disulfide exchange reactions.

Abstract: Digital images of documents such as bank checks are analyzed to determine acceptable image quality by capturing an image at a first or normal sensitivity and at a second or greater sensitivity. Both sets of image signals are subjected to speckle filtering to remove extraneous image elements or noise. The greater sensitivity signals are grouped in discrete areas having a predetermined number of pixels and black pixels which are connected are identified as an object in each discrete area. Each object is analyzed by measuring height, width, area, perimeter, aspect ratio, density ratio and perimeter to area ratio. Predetermined limits for these characteristics are applied to each object to classify the object as stroke-like or of another shape. Stroke-like objects are then compared with the object at the same position in the normal image field and a so-called area ratio of the number of black pixels in the normal image to the number of black pixels in the more intense image is determined.

Abstract: A system for electronically storing revisions or modifications to documents which are already electronically stored in unrevised or unmodified form. The system compares, at the pixel-by-pixel level, a modified document bit map with a stored document bit map and determines from the differences between the two bit maps, at the pixel-by-pixel level, which differences are significant and which are insignificant. A revised document bit map is then formed from the portions of the stored-document bit map exhibiting no significant bit map differences and the significant differences bit map. The result is a revised document bit map in which no unnecessary changes have been introduced into the initial stored-document bit map. The system also includes steps for defining, on a pixel-by-pixel basis, a significant region bit map from the significant difference bit map and for forming the revised document bit map using the significant region bit map.

Abstract: A method and apparatus for processing a video image so as to feature the boundaries between light and dark regions of the image. The method and apparatus are applicable to a video image which is represented by an array of pixels, in which each pixel is associated with a gray scale intensity value. According to the invention a center pixel is selected along with a plurality of pixels forming a two-dimensional neighborhood of the center pixel. From the intensity values associated with the pixels of the neighborhood, a determination is made whether or not the center pixel lies in a transition region, in which the image undergoes a rapid variation between light and dark. A bit value is then assigned to the center pixel, indicating whether the center pixel is to be black or white in the processed image. The bit value is assigned according to one of two predetermined algorithms depending on whether the center pixel was determined to lie within or not to lie within a transition region.

Abstract: A system for electronically storing revisions or modifications to documents which are already electronically stored in unrevised or unmodified form. The system compares, at the pixel-by-pixel level, a modified document bit map with a stored document bit map and determines from the differences between the two bit maps, at the pixel-by-pixel level, which differences are significant and which are insignificant. A revised document bit map is then formed from the portions of the stored-document bit map exhibiting no significant bit map differences and the significant differences bit map. The result is a revised document bit map in which no unnecessary changes have been introduced into the initial stored-document bit map. The system also includes steps for defining, on a pixel-by-pixel basis, a significant region bit map from the significant difference bit map and for forming the revised document bit map using the significant region bit map.

Abstract: A bill to be verified is scanned lengthwise by a two track optical sensor. For each bill the resulting analog signals are divided into eight segments or windows each segment producing a binary coded pattern produced by delta modulation. This is compared to a stored reference and a number is produced representing the dissimilarity between the bill being scanned and the average bill of that denomination with which it is being compared. Thereafter, a processor compares the foregoing numbers with additional quantitative functions which have previously been stored relating the corresponding segments of the bill denomination being scanned to other bill denominations. With the use of limit and weighting functions they are summed over the eight different effective windows and a decision is made as to whether the proper denomination is present.