Abstract: Fire protection apparatus, systems, and methods for addressing a fire with a mist are provided. More particularly, the invention provides systems and their method of design which provide a water mist to address and preferably suppress a fire. The invention further provides systems and methods for total flooding volume protection of a space to address a fire, preferably control, suppress, and more preferably extinguish a fire. The invention further provides atomizing devices for use in such systems and methods.

Abstract: A method, apparatus, system, and signal-bearing medium that in an embodiment determine at least one capability of a transfer of data, set at least one parameter that affects performance of the transfer to an initial state based on the capability, detect performance of the transfer, and modify the parameter based on the performance. In this way, the data transfer can adapt to changing capabilities of the network and the devices that send and receive the data.

Abstract: A video coding system and method for increasing a transmitted output bit rate of a video encoding system by altering the content of the bit stream. A video encoder may receive a coding mode signal from a computer application for coding source video data, the coding mode signal indicating a target bit rate having a risk factor related to transmission error associated to the target bit rate. The coded bitstream may be modified based on the risk factor indicated in the coding mode signal. A modified coded bitstream may be outputted at the target bit rate and at a reduced coding efficiency, and the channel may be tested for transmission errors. Based on the test results, a revised coding mode signal indicating the same target bit rate, but a revised risk factor may be provided. The coded bitstream may be revised by removing the modifications previously made to the coded bitstream and a revised coded bitstream having greater coding efficiency may be output at the target bit rate.

Abstract: An improved apparatus for generating a mist is provided. The apparatus has at least one working fluid supply conduit (66) having an inlet in fluid communication with a supply of working fluid and an outlet in fluid communication with a first mixing chamber. The apparatus also includes a plurality of transport fluid passages (60a,60b), each of which has an inlet adapted to receive a supply of transport fluid and an outlet in fluid communication with the mixing chamber. Downstream of the mixing chamber is a nozzle (72) having an inlet (74) in fluid communication with the mixing chamber, an outlet (78), and a throat portion (76) intermediate the nozzle inlet (74) and outlet (78). The throat portion (76) of the nozzle (72) has a cross sectional area which is less than that of either the nozzle inlet (74) or the nozzle outlet (78).

Abstract: An equipment carrier for transporting one or more work items includes a vertical frame attached to a base frame, where the base frame has, in a preferred embodiment, an expandable portion that telescopes out from the vertical frame. The equipment carrier also includes a locking mechanism for attaching the equipment carrier to a standard dolly. The use of the equipment carrier in combination with the dolly allows for easy transport of the equipment carrier. In one embodiment, work piece arms for supporting work items are pivotally connected to the front of the vertical frame allowing them to swing into horizontal position and then fold down into a vertical position. Also attached to the vertical frame is a strut that is also pivotally connected to the front face of the vertical frame. The strut swings up to support the work piece arm when it is in the horizontal position. The equipment carrier also has components for carrying additional accessories work items needed.

Abstract: The invention relates generally to methods, systems, and devices for measuring the concentration of target analytes present in a biological system using a series of measurements obtained from a monitoring system and a Mixtures of Experts (MOE) algorithm. In one embodiment, the present invention describes a method for measuring blood glucose in a subject.

Abstract: The present invention concerns methods and compositions for making and using multimeric, single chain proteins of a defined structure. In various embodiments the invention involves a bank or collection of one or more monomer nucleic acid species with each such nucleic acid species encoding a protein monomer subunit species and divided into separate subspecies, each bearing a distinct pair of position-specific subcloning restriction endonuclease recognition sites for cassette style cloning into an expression vector and making multimeric, single chain proteins of a defined structure.

Abstract: A method for detecting indicators of misleading content in a markup language coded document is provided. The method includes extracting a set of tags from the markup language coded document. The method also includes combining tags to create a tag structure signature. The tag structure signature is configured to include a set of n-grams. Each of the set of n-grams includes at least two tags from the set of tags. The method further includes comparing the tag structure signature against a set of known bad tag structure signatures to determine similarity.

Abstract: A foundation system for supporting a manufactured building having a support beam, comprising a ground pan having a planar surface received on a ground surface and a thermally insulative member disposed on the ground pan, which cooperatively define in situ a proximate thermally isolated ground column, with a foundation support connected to the ground pan and to the support beam, the thermally insulative member restricts communication of heat from the proximate thermally isolated ground column below the ground pan for resisting frost heaving. A method of resisting frost heave of a foundation is disclosed.

Abstract: A method and system are provided to encode a video sequence into a compressed bitstream. An encoder receives a video sequence from an image-capture device, together with metadata associated with the video sequence, and codes the video sequence into a first compressed bitstream using the metadata to select or revise a coding parameter associated with a coding operation. Optionally, the video sequence may be conditioned for coding by a preprocessor, which also may use the metadata to select or revise a preprocessing parameter associated with a preprocessing operation. The encoder may itself generate metadata associated with the first compressed bitstream, which may be used together with any metadata received by the encoder, to transcode the first compressed bitstream into a second compressed bitstream.

Abstract: A method and system are provided to encode a video sequence into a compressed bitstream. An encoder receives a video sequence from an image-capture device, together with metadata associated with the video sequence, and codes the video sequence into a first compressed bitstream using the metadata to select or revise a coding parameter associated with a coding operation. Optionally, the video sequence may be conditioned for coding by a preprocessor, which also may use the metadata to select or revise a preprocessing parameter associated with a preprocessing operation. The encoder may itself generate metadata associated with the first compressed bitstream, which may be used together with any metadata received by the encoder, to transcode the first compressed bitstream into a second compressed bitstream.

Abstract: A decontaminating system (100) comprising a decontaminant reservoir (152), a transport fluid source (160) and a mist generating apparatus (10). The mist generating apparatus (10) has a longitudinal axis and comprises a first fluid passage (38) having a first fluid inlet (18) in fluid communication with the decontaminant reservoir (152) and a first fluid outlet (84), and a second fluid passage (90) having a second fluid inlet (20) in fluid communication with the transport fluid source (160) and a second fluid outlet (94). The first passage (38) surrounds the second fluid passage (90) and the first and second outlets (84, 94) are oriented relative to one another such that they have an angle of incidence between (5) and (30) degrees. The second fluid passage (90) includes a throat portion (92) located between the second fluid inlet (20) and the second fluid outlet (94), the throat portion (92) having a smaller cross sectional area than that of either the second fluid inlet (20) or second fluid outlet (94).

Abstract: A method, apparatus, system, and signal-bearing medium that in an embodiment detect that a first packet is not received, add a place holder for the first packet in a buffer, request retransmission of the first packet, and create an estimated packet based on a combination of a second packet previous to the first packet, a third packet following the first packet, and a fourth packet from a previous frame that is spatially corresponding to the first packet. In another embodiment, a method, apparatus, system, and signal-bearing medium are provided that send a encoded packet to a receiver, save the encoded packet in a bitstream, determine whether the encoded packet is lost, and when the encoded packet is lost, decode the bitstream with the lost packet omitted and insert a reconstructed frame associated with the lost packet into a reference frame storage. In another embodiment, when the encoded packet is lost, a decoder is run on a reference frame chosen as the last uncorrupted frame.

Abstract: A travel trailer having exterior unitary lower and upper shells, an interior lower shell defining a pre-molded floor and side walls with a seating area, a cabinet for refrigerator and stove top, an opposing bench, a bathroom sink, and defining an aisle centrally therebetween; a shower pan attached to a side wall; an interior upper shell defining a pre-molded ceiling, side walls, and storage areas; a wall defining a door to a bathroom portion; and a wheeled chassis connected to the exterior lower shell with an extending tongue for attaching to a trailer hitch of a motor.

Abstract: Methods for pre-processing video sequences prior to compression to provide data reduction of the video sequence. Also, after compression of the pre-processed video sequence, the bit rate of the pre-processed and compressed video sequence will be lower than the bit rate of the video sequence after compression but without pre-processing. Pre-processing may include spatial anisotropic diffusion filtering such as Perona-Malik filtering, Fallah-Ford filtering, or omni-directional filtering that extends Perona-Malik filtering to perform filtering in at least one diagonal direction. Pre-processing may also include performing filtering differently on a foreground region than on a background region of a video frame. This method includes identifying pixel locations having pixel values matching characteristics of human skin and determining a bounding shape for each contiguous grouping of matching pixel locations.

Abstract: Example embodiments of the present invention provide a method or device for coding source video. The method or device may provide for a segment of video frames from the source video, computing a noise map for the segment of the source video where the noise map is computed from differences among pixels selected from spatially-distributed sampling patterns in the segment, computing control parameter adjustments based on the noise map, and coding the selected segment of source video according to control parameters generated from a default coding policy and the control parameter adjustments, where the default coding policy includes default control parameters of the encoder.

Abstract: A method and device for dithering video from a decoder. The method and device provide: selecting a segment of video frames from the video; computing a noise map for the segment of the video, the noise map computed from differences among pixels selected from spatially-distributed sampling patterns in the segment; determining contours of quantization artifacts within the video frame based on the noise map and a histogram of pixel values in the video frame; computing a gradient measurement of pixel values along the contours; identifying regions along the contours of quantization artifacts to apply dithering based on the noise map and the gradient measurement; determining a dithering strength based on the noise map and the gradient measurement; and applying dithering noise to the identified regions at the determined dithering strength.

Abstract: Embodiments of the present invention provides a method and device for processing a source video. The method and device may provide computing an artifact estimation from differences among pixels selected from spatially-distributed sampling patterns in the source video; filtering the source video to produce a filtered version of the source video, computing a blending factor based on the artifact estimation in the source video, and computing an output video by blending the source video and the filtered version of the source video based on the blending factor.

Abstract: A method for matching an image-form textual string in an image to a regular expression is disclosed. The method includes constructing a representation of the regular expression and generating a candidate string of characters from the image-form textual string. The method further includes ascertaining whether there exists a match between the image-form textual string and the regular expression, the match is deemed achieved if a probability value associated with the match is above a predetermined matching threshold.

Abstract: Embodiments of the present invention provide systems, methods and apparatuses for generating forward, backward or bi-directional P frames. Prior to encoding a sequence of video frames, P frames within the video sequence can be reordered to include causal and/or non-causal references to one or more reference frames. This allows any block partition of a bi-directional P frame to include a single reference to a reference frame that is temporally displayed either before or after the bi-directional P frame. Compression and visual quality can therefore be improved. Hierarchical frame structures can be constructed using bi-directional P frames to better accommodate low complexity decoding profiles. Multilayered encoded video bitstreams can be generated based on the hierarchical frame structures and can include a first layer of anchor frames and one or more second layers that include bi-directional P frames that reference the anchor frames and/or any frame in any lower level layer.