4821results about How to "Little change" patented technology

Apparatus is provided for treating a condition of a subject, including an electrode device, adapted to be coupled to an autonomic nerve of the subject, and a control unit. The control unit is adapted to drive the electrode device to apply to the nerve a stimulating current, which is capable of inducing action potentials in a therapeutic direction in a first set and a second set of nerve fibers of the nerve, and to drive the electrode device to apply to the nerve an inhibiting current, which is capable of inhibiting the induced action potentials traveling in the therapeutic direction in the second set of nerve fibers, the nerve fibers in the second set having generally larger diameters than the nerve fibers in the first set. Other embodiments are also described.

A wafer holder that prevents positional deviation of the wafer mounted on the wafer-mounting surface of a chuck top and enables better thermal uniformity of the wafer, as well as a heater unit including the wafer holder and a wafer prober mounting these are provided. The wafer holder has a chuck top mounting and fixing the wafer and a supporter supporting the chuck top, and the chuck top has water absorption of at least 0.01% and preferably at least 0.1%. Preferable material of the chuck top is a composite of metal and ceramics, and particularly, a composite of aluminum and silicon carbide, or a composite of silicon and silicon carbide.

A class of biological sensing devices that include a substrate comprising an array of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) to which are chemically attached biological molecules is disclosed. The attached biological molecules are capable of electrical conductivity that is responsive to chemical changes occurring as a result of their interaction with target species. A means for means for using DNA as a material of potential in molecular electronic sensor devices, being primarily based on molecular electron-transfer reaction processes between DNA-binding donors and acceptors is also disclosed, including composition, method of manufacture and their use are described.

A solar cell assembly including a plurality of solar cells is formed on a common substrate, and a DC/DC converter which converts the output from the solar cell is connected to each solar cell to constitute a solar power generation apparatus. The output from the solar power generation apparatus is converted into an AC power by an inverter and supplied to a load or commercial AC power system. Since the arrangement is simplified, the manufacturing cost can be reduced, and the influence of partial shade or a variation in characteristic decreases.

A method for fabricating a silicon oxide/silicon nitride/silicon oxide stacked layer structure is described. A bottom oxide layer is formed over a substrate. A surface treatment is then performed on the first silicon oxide layer to form an interface layer over the bottom oxide layer. The surface treatment is conducted in a nitrogen ambient. Thereafter, a silicon nitride layer is formed over the interface layer, followed by forming an upper silicon oxide layer over the silicon nitride layer.

A method for determining a gesture includes determining a change in a background of an image from a plurality of images, determining a object in the image, determining a trajectory of the object through the plurality of images, and classifying a gesture according to the trajectory of the object.

Apparatus is provided that includes an electrode device, adapted to be coupled to a vagus nerve of a subject, and a control unit, adapted to drive the electrode device to apply to the vagus nerve a current that reduces heart rate variability of the subject. Also provided is a method comprising applying to a vagus nerve of a subject a current that reduces heart rate variability of the subject.

The present invention provides an IC card that can realize high function without increasing the size of an IC chip, and that can realize cost reduction. The IC card comprises a first single crystal integrated circuit, a second integrated circuit, and a display device. The second integrated circuit and the display device are each formed from a thin film semiconductor film, over a plastic substrate, and the first single crystal integrated circuit is mounted on the plastic substrate so as to be electrically connected to the second integrated circuit.

To provide a method for producing chemically tempered glass, whereby frequency of replacement of the molten salt can be reduced. A method for producing chemically tempered glass, which comprises repeating ion exchange treatment of immersing glass in a molten salt, wherein the glass comprises, as represented by mole percentage, from 61 to 77% of SiO₂, from 1 to 18% of Al₂O₃, from 3 to 15% of MgO, from 0 to 5% of CaO, from 0 to 4% of ZrO₂, from 8 to 18% of Na₂O and from 0 to 6% of K₂O; SiO₂+Al₂O₃ is from 65 to 85%; MgO+CaO is from 3 to 15%; and R calculated by the following formula by using contents of the respective components, is at least 0.66:

R=0.029×SiO₂+0.021×Al₂O₃+0.016×MgO−0.004×CaO+0.016×ZrO₂+0.029×Na₂O+0×K₂O−2.002

In an apparatus for detecting a human face from an input image, candidate areas for an eye and candidate areas for an interval between eyes are detected from the image, an area of the interval between eyes is determined from the positional relationship between the candidate areas for an eye and candidate area for an interval between eyes, and a face area is determined so that the face area includes the area of the interval between eyes.

It is an object of the present invention to control the plane orientation of crystal grains obtained by using a laser beam, into a direction that can be substantially regarded as one direction in an irradiation region of the laser beam. After forming a cap film over a semiconductor film, the semiconductor film is crystallized by using a CW laser or a pulse laser having a repetition rate of greater than or equal to 10 MHz. The obtained semiconductor film has a plurality of crystal grains having a width of greater than or equal to 0.01 μm and a length of greater than or equal to 1 μm. In a surface of the obtained semiconductor film, a ratio of an orientation {211} is greater than or equal to 0.4 within the range of an angle fluctuation of ±10°.

An instrument for establishing orientation of a pelvic prosthesis comprises a tri-pod having an angularly adjustable guide rod on it. The tips of the legs define a plane, and the guide rod is set by the surgeon to a defined orientation with respect to this plane on the basis of preoperative studies. In use, two of the legs of the instrument are positioned by the surgeon at defined anatomical locations on the pelvis (e.g., a point in the region of the posterior/inferior acetabulum and a point on the anterior superior iliac spine). The third leg then lands on the pelvis at a point determined by the position of the first two points, as well as by the separations between the third leg and the other two legs. The separations are adjustable, but are preferably fixed percentages of the separation between the first and second legs. The position of the guide rod then defines with respect to the actual pelvis the direction for insertion of a prosthesis.

A method of fabricating a high-density array of holes in glass is provided, comprising providing a glass piece having a front surface, then irradiating the front surface of the glass piece with a UV laser beam focused to a focal point within +/−100 μm of the front surface of the glass piece most desirably within +/−50 μm of the front surface. The lens focusing the laser has a numerical aperture desirably in the range of from 0.1 to 0.4, more desirably in the range of from 0.1 to 0.15 for glass thickness between 0.3 mm and 0.63 mm, even more desirably in the range of from 0.12 to 0.13, so as to produce open holes extending into the glass piece 100 from the front surface 102 of the glass piece, the holes having an diameter the in range of from 5 to 15 μm, and an aspect ratio of at least 20:1. For thinner glass, in the range of from 0.1-0.3 mm, the numerical aperture is desirably from 0.25 to 0.4, more desirably from 0.25 to 0.3, and the beam is preferably focused to within +/−30 μm of the front surface of the glass. The laser is desirable operated at a repetition rate of about 15 kHz or below. An array of holes thus produced may then be enlarged by etching. The front surface may be polished prior to etching, if desired.

A system monitors and characterizes internal elasticity of a blood vessel to detect abnormality. A catheter system for heart performance characterization and abnormality detection, comprises an ultrasound device for emitting ultrasound wave signals within patient anatomy and acquiring corresponding ultrasound echo signals. A signal processor processes the ultrasound echo signals to, determine a signal indicating displacement of a tissue wall over at least one heart cycle and identify a displacement value in the displacement signal. The displacement value indicates a tissue wall displacement occurring at a point within a heart cycle. A comparator compares the tissue wall displacement value with a threshold value to provide a comparison indicator. A patient monitor, in response to the comparison indicator indicating the tissue wall displacement value exceeds the threshold value, generates an alert message associated with the threshold.

The present invention enables permanent biometric authentication without the risk of forgery or the like. The present invention enables living-tissue discrimination as well as biometric authentication. The roughness distribution pattern of deep-layer tissue of the skin covered with epidermal tissue is detected, thereby extracting a unique pattern of the living tissue. Then, biometric authentication is performed based upon the detected pattern. The roughness distribution pattern of the deep-layer tissue of the skin is optically detected using difference in optical properties between the epidermal tissue and the deep-layer tissue of the skin. In this case, long-wavelength light, e.g., near-infrared light is used as illumination light cast onto the skin tissue. A fork structure of a subcutaneous blood vessel is used as the portion which is to be detected, for example. The portion which is to be detected is determined based upon the structure of the fork structure. In this case, the living-tissue discrimination may be made using the subcutaneous blood vessel.