Abstract: A machine (1) for preparing food or beverage products is provided. Said machine (1) is adapted for injecting a fluid under pressure in an ingredient capsule inserted therein. Said machine (1) comprises a fluid reservoir (3), a fluid system, a fluid heating element, and a controller for managing at least one preparation parameter, and further comprises a selector for allowing a user to manually select at least one food or beverage preparation parameter.

Abstract: A balancing device for a rotating part of a turbomachine, includes a ferrule pierced with a plurality of ports, a balancing screw passing through each port, each balancing screw including a body and a head, the head of each balancing screw being pierced with a recess, the balancing screws being of at least one first type, the recess of the screws of the first type being formed by a driving recess from which an additional recess extends.

Abstract: A circuit for providing thermal compensation for a driver circuit used to drive light emitting diodes (LEDs) is provided. The driver circuit can include a rectifier circuit configured to rectify an AC power source into a DC power source providing a DC source voltage. The driver circuit can further include a boost circuit configured to boost the DC source voltage to provide a drive voltage for driving the light emitting diodes. The boost circuit can include a switching element that is controlled based at least in part on a current sense circuit having a sense transistor. A thermal tracking transistor is provided as part of the reference to the sense circuit.

Abstract: An anti-rotation device for a nut in tightened position on a male part, includes a plurality of upper notches provided on one end of the nut, the upper notches extending along a longitudinal axis of the nut, a plurality of lower notches provided in one peripheral zone of the male part, the lower notches extending along a longitudinal axis of the male part, and the lower and higher notches at least partially overlapping when the nut is in tightened position on the male part, a ring including at least one locking component accommodated both in one of the lower notches of the male part and in one of the higher notches of the nut.

Abstract: A T-piece preformer for forming a T-piece in a pipe-in-pipe (PIP) pipeline for a marine environment, the PIP pipeline has at least inner and outer pipes having an annular space thereinbetween, and one or more cables extending along the annular space. The T-piece preformer includes at least: (a) inner and outer longitudinal collars; (b) annular walls between the inner and outer collars; (c) cable apertures through each annular wall; and (d) one or more guide points on the outer collar radially offset from the or each cable apertures, to guidance for a hole into the T-piece performer. The T-piece preformer can be assembled into a PIP pipeline, and requires a final hole during laying. The T-piece preformer has cable apertures through each annular wall, for allowing continuation of cables in the annular space through the PIP pipeline and T-piece preformer, and the T-piece.

Abstract: An LED driver is presented with a sensing circuit and attenuator circuits to provide three-way switched dimming as well as phase-cut dimming to control the output power driving an LED load allowing installation into conventional three-way switched lamp sockets or in sockets wired to a wall or table mounted phase-cutting dimmer control. When installed in a three way socket, the circuit senses the position of the three way switch and changes the lamp current accordingly. The lamp can also be dimmed by a table-top dimmer or a wall dimmer (in a three-way socket or in a conventional dual contact socket) by applying a phase-cut power input, with the driver circuit including circuitry to sense the average value of a phase-cut power line to adjust lamp current.

Abstract: An apparatus and method is presented for implementing and controlling a voltage converter with one input voltage and multiple output voltages. In the case of boost and buck-boost converters, a converter circuit with one inductor and a switched group of parallel connection capacitors is realized, one parallel connection for each output voltage. A duty ratio is monitored for the inductor and the switched group of capacitors to provide a set of duty ratios. The duty ratios form a control vector which describes the control inputs. The output voltages are the control outputs describing a MIMO system. A generalized Cuk-Middlebrook modeling approach is applied to the voltage converter, along with linearization and MIMO control methods to regulate all output voltages to desired levels.

Abstract: A system for storing and disseminating knowledge contained in documents includes a document annotator that creates a structured syntactic textual model of each of the documents, an ontology directed extractor that extracts properties from the textual models, a database for storing the textual models and the properties, and an interface permitting queries to the database. The document annotator includes a plurality of data transformers and a plurality of custom annotator tools. The ontology directed extractor includes an ontology based schema definition and a plurality of ontology based data transformers. The interface includes a plurality of XSLT style sheets selectable according to context.

Abstract: Light sources are presented in which lamp ballast or LED driver circuitry is disposed within a base assembly using integrated boards with components embedded between board layers and/or circular flex boards with pot core magnetic components and/or ASICs and thermally conductive board core materials with thermal vias, reflective mirrors, and/or potting materials to conduct heat out through the base to facilitate reduced form factors for lamps and/or LED light sources.

Abstract: An anti-rotation device for a nut in tightened position on a male part, includes a plurality of upper notches provided on one end of the nut, the upper notches extending along a longitudinal axis of the nut, a plurality of lower notches provided in one peripheral zone of the male part, the lower notches extending along a longitudinal axis of the male part, and the lower and higher notches at least partially overlapping when the nut is in tightened position on the male part, a ring including at least one locking component accommodated both in one of the lower notches of the male part and in one of the higher notches of the nut.

Abstract: Fluorescent lamp ballasts and methods are disclosed in which a resonant impedance of a self-oscillating inverter is modified to control the inverter frequency to selectively preheat lamp cathodes using power from the inverter output during a preheating period after power is applied and to change the inverter frequency to a different range following ignition of the lamp.

Abstract: A pre-programmed energy saving ballast or driver is presented, having a pre-defined energy profile to which the output power is controlled in accordance with the current time ascertained from the input power connection via simplex clock information or from received broadcast time signals, and which allows a user to select from a number of pre-programmed profiles and/or to modify and store user-defined energy profiles.

Abstract: A method includes scanning to detect presence of a wireless local area network WLAN, detecting presence of said wireless local area network, contacting a base station of said wireless local area network detected to request the location of said base station, and receiving location of said wireless area network.

Abstract: A driver circuit includes an inverter having a controlled switch with an input for controlling switching operations. A tuned circuit has a resonant frequency when connected to a resonant load. The tuned circuit receives inverter output and generates a driving signal. Frequency of the inverter output and frequency of the driving signal substantially equal the resonant frequency of the tuned circuit. The tuned circuit boosts the inverter output to generate the driving signal such that a voltage of the driving signal is greater than a voltage of the inverter output. A feedback portion receives the inverter output and phase-shifts it to generate an inverter control signal. The feedback portion provides the inverter control signal to the input of the controlled switch to control switching operations of controlled switch. The driver self-oscillates at the resonant frequency due to the feedback portion phase-shifting the inverter output to generate the inverter control signal.

Abstract: Drivers and ballast circuits are presented having a boost converter with a triac compatibility circuit providing regulated current load to accommodate phase-cutting triac circuit holding current requirements, including auto switching driver circuit with overvoltage protection and an auto leveling circuit to regulate against thermal and load fluctuations.

Abstract: Light source power circuits and EMI filters therefor are presented in which a depletion mode field effect transistor is connected in series with an EMI filter capacitor following an input rectifier to allow filtering of EMI and to limit capacitive currents during triac switching when powered through a phase-cutting dimmer circuit.

Abstract: An LED driver circuit and an isolated DC-DC converter therefor are presented, in which a primary side state estimator circuit is provided for inferred output current sensing for closed loop control of pulse width modulated flyback or buck converters. Specifically, the estimator circuit includes a capacitance having a first terminal coupled to a comparator input of a pulse width modulation controller, and a second terminal coupled to an error input of an error amplifier, and a switching device having a first power terminal coupled to the second terminal of the capacitance, a second power terminal coupled to the circuit ground, and a control input terminal coupled to a drive output of the pulse width modulation controller.

Abstract: A spread spectrum receiver configured to perform cell searching can include a cell search system and a searcher. The cell search system is configured to perform primary and secondary synchronization, thereby identifying a scrambling code group. The searcher is configured to determine a scrambling code from the scrambling code group identified by the cell search system.

Abstract: A method and apparatus for controlling a primary cell search operation including generating a profile of correlation peaks, determining if magnitudes of the correlation peaks vary, synchronizing a signal acquisition process to one of the identified correlation peak having a greatest magnitude if the magnitudes of the correlation peaks remain relatively constant and synchronizing the signal acquisition process to a peak whose magnitude is increasing if the magnitudes of the correlation peaks are changing. The method and apparatus further include identifying an index and a magnitude of a largest correlation peak of the correlation peaks, determining if other correlation peaks exist in the profile, synchronizing the signal acquisition process to the largest correlation peak originally identified if other correlation peaks do not exist, storing indices and magnitudes for all other correlation peaks located and comparing changes in correlation peak magnitudes for all previously identified peaks.

Abstract: A system and method for supporting updates of database contact information to mobile communications devices includes a system having a data entry computer for compiling database contact information for a group of mobile communications devices, a service provider computer server in signal communication with the data entry computer for uploading the database contact information into the service provider computer server and for downloading the database contact information substantially simultaneously to the group of mobile communications devices, and a mobile communications device in signal communication with the service provider computer server for receiving the database contact information and for updating its own global logical database; wherein the method for supporting updates of database contact information to mobile communications devices includes the steps of compiling database contact information for a group of mobile communications devices, uploading the database contact information to a service provid