Abstract: Several embodiments include a cooking instrument. The cooking instrument can include a heating system. The heating system can include one or more heating elements capable of emitting wireless energy into the cooking chamber. The cooking instrument can also include a control system. The control system can executing a heating sequence to drive the heating system, detect, based on an output signal of a sensor, a trigger event, and configure the heating system in response to detecting the trigger event.

Abstract: Several embodiments include a cooking appliance/instrument (e.g., oven). The cooking appliance/instrument can include a cooking chamber, a support tray adapted to hold food in the cooking chamber; and a heating system comprised of at least a heating element. The heating system is adapted to emit waves according to a particular configuration such that the emitted waves is substantially transparent or substantially opaque to the support tray and thus enabling the cooking instrument to select what to heat.

Abstract: Several embodiments include a cooking appliance. The cooking appliance can include one or more heating elements; a cooking chamber; and a camera attached to the interior of the chamber. In some embodiments, the cooking chamber prevents any visible light from escaping the chamber (e.g., the cooking chamber is windowless). In some embodiments, the heating elements are controlled by a computing device in the cooking appliance. In some embodiments, the output of the camera is used to adjust heating pattern of the heating elements.

Abstract: A remote parking meter monitoring system is provided. The system has a plurality of radio transceivers. Each transceiver communicates with at least one other transceiver within a transceiver communication region. The transceivers are integrated to parking meters. A separate aggregate point has a transceiver and a communication network that is connected to a computer. The aggregate point communicates with at least one proximal transceiver and communicates to the computer through the network. The system has a mesh communication arrangement, and a signal routing architecture, where the information is communicated along any path of adjacent communication regions. The computer is able to communicate information through the network to the aggregate point, and the aggregate point transceiver sends the information to the proximal transceiver.

Abstract: A real-time parking activity measurement system comprising multiple, self-powered, mesh networked wireless vehicle sensors, a collection device, and a host computer. The wireless mesh network architecture allows the wireless vehicle sensors to be more reliable and to be more energy efficient by at least an order of magnitude compare to traditional wireless point-to-point and star-topology architectures. This architecture also enables the expansion of the measurement area without any additional infrastructure besides the necessary addition of wireless vehicle sensors.

Abstract: A remote parking meter monitoring system is provided. The system has a plurality of radio transceivers. Each transceiver communicates with at least one other transceiver within a transceiver communication region. The transceivers are integrated to parking meters. A separate aggregate point has a transceiver and a communication network that is connected to a computer. The aggregate point communicates with at least one proximal transceiver and communicates to the computer through the network. The system has a mesh communication arrangement, and a signal routing architecture, where the information is communicated along any path of adjacent communication regions. The computer is able to communicate information through the network to the aggregate point, and the aggregate point transceiver sends the information to the proximal transceiver.