Abstract: The diagnosis apparatus according to the invention for the picture providing recording of fluorescing biological tissue by way of an endoscope contains a stimulation light source which beams spectral components suitable for fluorescence stimulation into the tissue through the endoscope. The fluorescent light reflected by the tissue reaches through the endoscope optics into a head piece where it is split into a green, and spacially separated from this, a red spectral component and falls each on one half of a CCD solid body of a highly sensitive black and white camera.

Abstract: A running web or discrete tubular wrappers of rod-shaped articles of the tobacco processing industry are perforated with a variable-intensity high-energy pulsed laser beam which is controlled in such a way that the intensity of radiation and/or the length of pulses is altered in response to variations in the speed of advancement of the web or discrete wrappers past the perforating station. This ensures that the permeability of the thus obtained ventilation zones is not influenced by the speed of advancement of the material to be perforated past the perforating station. The intensity of radiation and/or the length of pulses can also be influenced by one or more monitored characteristics of the articles, such as the permeability of their wrappers.

Abstract: Apparatus for making perforations in a running web of wrapping material for tobacco or filter rods or in the wrappers of discrete cigarettes has a carbon dioxide laser with two parallel resonators which are mechanically coupled to each other to define a U-shaped resonance chamber and the free ends of which carry partially transmitting mirrors for the passage of discrete active beams of coherent radiation. The two active beams are thereupon split into pairs of split beams and the split beams are focused upon the running web of wrapping material or upon the wrappers of successive rod-shaped articles to simultaneously form four rows of perforations.

Abstract: Apparatus for making perforations in continuous or interrupted webs of cigarette paper or the like has one or more perforating units serving to direct radiant or electrical energy against selected portions of the web to make holes therein. That portion of each perforating unit which surrounds the locus of propagation of energy beyond the respective perforating unit is externally cooled and cleaned by one or more streams of compressed gas which ensure that such portion cannot accumulate solid combustion products which could interfere with the propagation of energy toward the web. The stream or streams are furnished by the orifices of nozzles which can be provided in the carrier or carriers for the perforating units or can be outwardly adjacent to the carrier or carriers.

Abstract: Apparatus for perforating a web of wrapping material or tubular wrappers of discrete filter cigarettes of unit length or double unit length in a filter tipping machine has a laser which is energizable at a frequency depending on the speed of the main prime mover of the machine to emit a beam which is reflected by a pivotable reflector to impinge alternately upon different portions of a single optical system or upon several discrete optical systems serving to focus the beam upon the web or upon discrete wrappers whereby the beam forms two or more rows or more complex patterns of perforations in the web or in the wrappers of successive cigarettes. The pivotable reflector can be omitted or is optional if a diffraction grating is placed in front of a single optical system so that the grating splits the beam into several discrete beams each of which is focused upon a different portion of the web or of the wrapper of a cigarette.

Abstract: A distributor for use in a cigarette maker has a relatively long and relatively narrow upright duct whose upper end receives particles of tobacco from one or more magazines by way of an endless belt. The resulting column of tobacco descends through the lower end of the duct and into the range of orbiting needles at the periphery of a horizontal drum. An oscillating barrier is interposed between the lower end of the rear wall of the duct and the path of needles close to the apex of the drum. The barrier has a profiled rib which extends into the lower end of the duct to homogenize the lower end of the descending column of tobacco as well as to promote uniform filling of gaps between the neighboring needles with particles of tobacco along the full axial length of the drum. The particles are expelled from the gaps by a picker roller and are converted into a wide carpet, thereupon into a narrow stream and finally into a rod-like filler.