Did You Know...
...that the Band-Aid Bandage was invented by a Johnson & Johnson employee whose wife had cut herself? Earl Dickson's wife was rather accident prone, so he set out to develop a bandage that she could apply without help. He placed a small piece of gauze in the center of a small piece of surgical tape, and what we know today as the Band Aid bandage was born!
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| Number | Title | Issue Date |
| 5473624 | Laser system and method for selectively severing links A laser system and processing method exploits the absorption contrast between the materials from which a link (12) and an underlying substrate (22) are made to effectively remove the link from the substrate. Laser output in a wavelength range of 1.2 to 3 ... | 12/05/1995 |
| 5473338 | Addressing method and system having minimal crosstalk effects The optical response of the pixels of many flat panel display devices, such as liquid crystal displays (2), depends upon the spectral components, as well as the rms value, of the pixel voltage waveform during a frame period. Because each row and column el... | 12/05/1995 |
| 5469403 | Digital sonar system A transponder of an active digital sonar system identifies a multifrequency underwater activating sonar signal received from a remote sonar transmitter. The transponder includes a transducer that receives acoustic waves, including the activating sonar sig... | 11/21/1995 |
| 5464981 | Methods of separating selected items from a mixture including raisins and the selected items Methods of operating an automated optical inspection system to separate selected items, e.g., grape stems (124, 126, 128), grape leaves (122), or rocks from a mixture (16) of those items and raisins (120) include illuminating the mixture with illumination... | 11/07/1995 |
| 5459495 | Gray level addressing for LCDs Method and apparatus for providing gray level addressing for passive liquid crystal display (LCD) panels having overlapping row and column electrodes defining pixels are disclosed. Depending upon whether the rows are being addressed by "standard" or "Swif... | 10/17/1995 |
| 5455952 | Method of computing based on networks of dependent objects An object dependency network-based data visualization system allows a user to graphically edit a network of displayed objects and their interconnections to specify an underlying data computing and data visualization process. Each displayed object is selec... | 10/03/1995 |
| 5453594 | Radiation beam position and emission coordination system A radiation beam position and emission system coordinates the emission and position of a radiation beam to accurately move it along an intended path. This is accomplished by synchronizing a fixed clock that directs the motion of a servomechanism with a va... | 09/26/1995 |
| 5446584 | Compact specimen processing station The present invention is a compact specimen processing station (10) that processes vertically oriented specimens. Specimen storage, transport, and inspection components (26, 28, and 30) are all mounted to a vibration-damped support structure (14) and are ... | 08/29/1995 |
| 5443164 | Plastic container sorting system and method A plastic container sorter (10) moves labeled plastic containers (14, 20, 48, 54, 58) of various colors and transparencies through an inspection zone (18). A pair of line-scanning color cameras (22, 24) capture respective transmittance and reflectance ima... | 08/22/1995 |
| 5442758 | Apparatus and method for achieving reduced overhead mutual exclusion and maintaining coherency in a multiprocessor system utilizing execution history and thread monitoring A substantially zero overhead mutual-exclusion apparatus and method (90, 120) is provided that allows concurrent reading and updating data while maintaining data coherency. That is, a data reading process executes the same sequence of instructions that wo... | 08/15/1995 |
| 5440322 | Passive matrix display having reduced image-degrading crosstalk effects Image quality is improved in an rms-responding, passive matrix display system (10) by correcting for voltages induced onto row addressing electrodes (22) by voltage transitions on column electrodes (24). Net crosstalk voltages sensed at nodes (88N and 88P... | 08/08/1995 |
| 5440127 | Method and apparatus for illuminating target specimens in inspection systems An illumination system (12) for an optical inspection and sorting apparatus (10) includes a rare gas discharge lamp (36) for emitting select wavelengths of radiation. Rare gas discharge lamp (36) includes a light transmissive outer envelope (58) and conta... | 08/08/1995 |
| 5431289 | Product conveyor A conveyor system for transporting and aligning articles to be sorted in an automated bulk processing system is disclosed. The conveyor comprises one or more product-carrying lanes, each lane comprising two side belts separated by a central product-carryi... | 07/11/1995 |
| 5428442 | Inspection system with in-lens, off-axis illuminator An inspection system (2) employs a beam of monochromatic light (12) that travels through a Fourier transform lens (16) before striking a specimen wafer (4) at an angle (.THETA.) with respect to the normal (26) of the specimen wafer (4) to produce diffract... | 06/27/1995 |
| 5428365 | Method and apparatus for generating uniform illumination A reflector assembly (60) for a fiber-optic matrix display system (10) designed to improve the coupling efficiency of luminous energy between a light emitting element (52) and an input matrix (26) and to provide one or more input matrices (26) with substa... | 06/27/1995 |
| 5426796 | Support bar accessory for collapsible bed A removable support accessory (30) is positionable relative to one or more support bars (15, 16) of a bed frame (12) of a collapsible bed (10) to provide a substantially greater support base and more planar bed and seat support planes (23, 82). The suppor... | 06/27/1995 |
| 5421119 | Rifle firing pin An M16/AR-15 rifle firing pin of a unitary titanium construction includes a head section with a head that a rifle hammer hits to drive the firing pin against the primer of a cartridge. The head section includes a shoulder with a radially outer edge. The s... | 06/06/1995 |
| 5419438 | Apparatus and method for sorting post-consumer articles according to PVC content In a preferred embodiment, a sorting apparatus according to the present invention includes a conveyor belt for carrying a stream randomly-arranged articles, at least some of which are post-consumer plastic articles made of PVC and others of which are made... | 05/30/1995 |
| 5420604 | LCD addressing system An addressing method and apparatus addresses faster responding liquid crystal display panels (LCDs) so that video rate, high information content LCDs having time constants on the order of 50 ms or less are perceived as having improved contrast by limiting... | 05/30/1995 |
| 5416469 | Method for prediction of times of voiding utilizing temperature measurements A temperature sensor (10), which is connected to a sampling/recording meter (14), is imbedded in a diaper (22). The meter measures and records the temperature of the sensor at time intervals of, for example, one minute over a predetermined period of, for ... | 05/16/1995 |
| 5415700 | Concrete solar cell An inexpensive, robust concrete solar cell (10) comprises a photovoltaic material embedded in and extending beyond the major surfaces (16 and 18) of a matrix layer (14). The matrix layer typically comprises a high strength, cementitious material, such as ... | 05/16/1995 |
| 5402264 | Cleaning apparatus for light tube in an optical inspection system An optical inspection system (10) has an inspection region (20) through which articles (12) pass and are illuminated by illumination (22) provided by an illumination source (30). The source is shielded from the inspection region by a protective shield or ... | 03/28/1995 |
| 5398818 | Center shot sorting system and method A system and method for sorting items (16) computes the geometric center ("centroid") (156) of any item containing a defect (26) or multiple defects, and directs an ejection air blast at the centroid of the defective item rather than at the location of th... | 03/21/1995 |
| 5393683 | Method of making semiconductor devices having two-layer gate structure The present invention includes a method of forming semiconductor oxide layers and, in particular, gate oxide layers, in MOS semiconductor devices formed on silicon substrates. The method includes the steps of forming a first silicon oxide sublayer on the ... | 02/28/1995 |
| 5392227 | System and method for generating electronic circuit simulation models having improved accuracy A system and method accurately translate a structural data file (30) that describes a complex logic circuit into a simulation model file (40) executable by a simulator (42). A net-list (34) is traversed, and the resulting model description is compiled int... | 02/21/1995 |
| 5382806 | Specimen carrier platform and scanning assembly Specimen carrier carousels adapted to support a plurality of specimen carriers in a radial configuration and selectively position specimen carriers at associated processing stations are disclosed. Specimen carriers mounted on the carousel are automaticall... | 01/17/1995 |
| 5367647 | Apparatus and method for achieving improved SCSI bus control capacity An apparatus and a method facilitate the sharing of a SCSI address ID between a SCSI initiator and a target device. The SCSI standard does not prohibit ID sharing under a set of operating conditions defined by this invention. The shared ID is preferably u... | 11/22/1994 |
| 5367390 | Contrast improvement for display panels with masks between electrodes and covering split between electrode portions A non-emissive flat panel display, such as an LCD having a plurality of pixels defined by the overlapping areas of row and column electrodes, is provided with a novel mask arrangement to block light from leaking through the interpixel spaces or gaps witho... | 11/22/1994 |
| 5365671 | Inclinometer A two-axis tilt sensor, or inclinometer (10), uses a spherical reference element (18) floating in an inert fluid (20) and including a magnet (42) to produce an asymmetrical weight distribution. The asymmetrical weight distribution maintains the spherical ... | 11/22/1994 |
| 5362713 | Drilling mud compositions The addition of relatively small quantities of reticulated bacterial cellulose to well bore drilling muds improves their rheological properties. A preferred reticulated bacterial cellulose is one produced under agitated culture conditions using strains of... | 11/08/1994 |
| 5362545 | Aligned fiber reinforcement panel for structural wood members A reinforcing panel and process for making the same for use in reinforcing wood structural members including laminated beams, wood I-beams, and trusses. The reinforcing panel is comprised of a plurality of synthetic fibers that are arranged parallel to on... | 11/08/1994 |
| 5361268 | Switchable two-wavelength frequency-converting laser system and power control therefor A laser system and power control have a polarization state changer that produces in response to an incident beam with selected polarization state at a first wavelength λ1 a beam at λ1 with a desired polarization state. A frequency ... | 11/01/1994 |
| 5355188 | Method and apparatus for distortion correction in optical projectors A projector (100) including an liquid crystal display image source (120), a field lens (126), and a projection lens (128) projects a full-color image by projecting and converging images of multiple liquid crystal displays ("LCDs"). The image is properly p... | 10/11/1994 |
| 5354025 | Furniture shelf support bracket The present invention includes a furniture shelf support bracket for supporting a furniture shelf and connecting it to a vertical furniture member such as, for example, a cylindrical vertical tube. In a preferred embodiment, the support bracket includes a... | 10/11/1994 |
| 5353075 | Convertible flat panel display system A flat panel display that is convertible between direct and projection display applications is incorporated in an information processing device of a unitary construction. In preferred embodiment, the information processing device is selectively configurab... | 10/04/1994 |
| 5350528 | Method of supporting fractures in geological formations and hydraulic fluid composition for same The addition of relatively small quantities of a bacterial cellulose to hydraulic fracturing fluids improves their rheological properties for hydraulic fracturing of geological formations. Proppant suspension is markedly improved and friction loss through... | 09/27/1994 |
| 5339889 | Controlled biocide feeder for cooling water systems In accordance with the present invention, a controlled biocide feeder limits growth of bacteria (e.g., Legionella pneumophila) in heat transfer water of building air conditioning systems. Preferably, a flow of heat transfer water is directed across a soli... | 08/23/1994 |
| 5338006 | Gate valve with improved seal unit A gate valve sealing unit includes first and second annular seal members that are attached to a main body structure within a passageway that receives and is selectively occluded by a gate. The first and second seal members include first and second rigid m... | 08/16/1994 |
| 5337893 | High capacity carrier plate Generally planar component carrier plates and loading plates include a framework having a perimeter portion and an interior portion having an array of component passageways. A resilient layer is positioned parallel to the interior portion and is provided ... | 08/16/1994 |
| 5337884 | Lubrication system for a conveyor belt An optical inspection system (10) has a conveyor belt (18) that turns at a non-rotating turning bar (22). An inner surface (20) of the conveyor belt contacts a turning surface (22T) of the turning bar. A reservoir (60) for holding a lubricant (62), such a... | 08/16/1994 |
