Denso Corporation

Kabushiki Kaisha Toyota Chuo Kenkyusho

Nippondenso Co., Ltd.

Nippon Soken, Inc.

Keiichi Yamada

Yasuhiro Oya

Yasuaki Tsujimura

Kazuhiko Koike

Hideki Kita

Naoki Kondo

Yosinori Akiyama

Naoto Miwa

Tomohiko Nakanishi

Mineki Soga

Shin Yamamoto

Akio Nara

Hidetaka Hayashi

Hideki Hyuga

Shunkichi Ueno

Mitsuhiko Ohta

Tomoaki Nakano

Katsumi Yoshida

Jayaseelan Daniel Doni

A needle-shaped ceramic body having as its base material a cordierite porous body having a high specific surface area and superior thermal shock resistance, and a needle-shaped catalyst-ceramic body are provided. The present invention relates to a needle-shaped ceramic body having as its base material a needle-shaped cordierite in which the tips thereof are rounded, a needle-shaped catalyst-ceramic body loaded with a catalyst, and a method of production of a ceramic body in which a portion of a raw material (fluoride) gasified by a reaction between raw materials is grown into a needle like shape on the metal catalyst (Fe), wherein the tips of needle-shaped particles are rounded, using a vapor-liquid-solid (VLS) reaction, in a raw material burning process. A honeycomb structure composed of the needle-shaped ceramic for supporting a catalyst is provided, in which decreases in specific surface area caused by sintering can be inhibited, and it enables early catalyst activation due to the low thermal capacity, and has low pressure loss.

Ceramic support capable of supporting catalyst, catalyst-ceramic body and processes for producing same

A ceramic body, a ceramic catalyst body, a ceramic catalyst body and related manufacturing methods are disclosed wherein a cordierite porous base material has a surface, formed with acicular particles made of a component different from that of cordierite porous base material, which has an increased specific surface area with high resistance to a sintering effect. The ceramic body is manufactured by preparing a slurry containing an acicular particle source material, preparing a porous base material, applying the slurry onto a surface of the porous base material and firing the porous base material, whose surface is coated with the slurry, to cause acicular particles to develop on the surface of the porous base material. A part of or a whole of surfaces of the acicular particles is coated with a constituent element different from that of the acicular particles.

Ceramic body, ceramic catalyst body and related manufacturing methods

A surrounding conditions display apparatus captures an image of an area surrounding a movable body and displays the captured image. The apparatus includes a CCD camera for capturing an image of the surrounding are, ultrasonic sensors for detecting a distance to an obstacle present in the surrounding area, and a liquid crystal display for displaying the image captured by the image capturing unit. A color image representing an area including the obstacle is superposed on the displayed image in such a manner that the brightness of the color image decreases with increasing distance from the origin of the area.

Surrounding conditions display apparatus

In an image conversion method and apparatus, luminance Yof each pixel of a converted image is obtained by use of an expression Y=CY+CYand from luminance Yof a corresponding pixel of a source image, luminance Yof a corresponding pixel of a low frequency image, and Cand Cwhich are functions of the luminance Y. Since C+Cis constant when Y&#x2266;T, contrast of a low frequency component can be prevented from decreasing. In a portion in which the luminance Yof the low frequency image is low, the low frequency image is enhanced. In a portion in which the luminance Yof the low frequency image is high, the low frequency image is suppressed. In a method and apparatus for detecting noise level of an original signal in real time, a plurality of local regions are set on an input image in such a manner that the local regions are distributed uniformly over the entire area of an image. In each local region, determination as to whether or not luminance is saturated is performed. Variation in luminance is detected in each of a plurality of unsaturated local regions. Noise level is determined on the basis of the detected variation.

Image processing method and apparatus

A heater unit 1 has a plurality of flat heaters 11 adjacently arranged side by side and having common upper and lower surfaces. The thickness T of the heaters 11 is substantially uniform. Each heater 11 has an adjacent end surface 111 which faces toward an adjacent end surface 111 of the adjacent heater 11. The heater unit 1 also has upper and lower electrodes 21 holding the heaters 11 and respectively attached to the upper and lower surfaces of the heaters 11. The adjacent end surfaces 111 of the heaters 11 adjoining each other, and the upper and lower electrodes 21 form an air gap 12 therebetween. The creepage distance L along each adjacent end surface 111 is larger than the thickness T of the heaters 11. The dielectric strength of the heater unit 1 depends on the creepage distance L. The thickness T of the heaters 11 can be decreased without decreasing the dielectric strength of the heater unit 1. The output of the heater unit 1 increases when the thickness T is decreased.

Heater unit having increased dielectric strength

A positive TCR thermistor device has excellent electrical contact between a heat generator and heat radiating blocks and high heat transfer efficiency therebetween. The positive TCR thermistor includes a heat generator having a positive temperature coefficient of resistance and heat radiating blocks supplying electric current to the heat generator and heating a heated medium by receiving heat generated by the heat generator. The heat generator is provided with a metallic paste electrode at a contact surface which is in contact with the heat radiating blocks and oil having flowability is disposed between the metallic paste electrode of the heat generator and the heat radiating blocks.

Positive TCR thermistor device having surface roughness and filling oil

An image sensing device is provided with an expanded dynamic range when it photographs a moving object. A first gray value D1 of first picture taken with first exposure time is read in the first time interval and a second gray value D2 of second picture taken with second exposure time is read in the second time interval. Two function values f(D2) and g(D2) are calculated with respect to the second gray value D2. Then, a weight coefficient with respect to the function f(D2) is multiplied by the first gray value D1 and a weight coefficient with respect to the function g(D2) is multiplied by the second gray value D2. Those multiplied gray values are summed up. Such calculation of multiplying and summing up is carried out in each picture element of the first picture and the second picture, respectively.

Image sensing device having expanded dynamic range

A positive-temperature-coefficient thermistor heating device including of a PTC element, a first electrode formed on its surface, a heat radiating means having heat radiating fins and a second electrode, and conductive particles contained in the first electrode and electrically conductive with the second electrode, and, also, a process for production of a positive-temperature-coefficient thermistor heating device including the steps of printing an electrode material paste containing conductive particles on the surface of a PTC element, heating this to bake it on and form a first electrode having a rough surface, and bringing the first electrode and the second electrode of the heat radiating means into contact by the conductive particles.

Growing community of inventors

Aichi, Japan

Keiichi Yamada