Provided are an X-ray contrast agent using gold nanoparticles and a process for preparing the X-ray contrast agent. The X-ray contrast agent is prepared by capping gold nanoparticles with polyethylene glycol (PEG). The X-ray contrast agent is nontoxic and remains in a blood vessel for a long time so that the X-ray contrast agent can be usefully used as a computed tomography (CT) contrast agent for imaging blood vessels. Therefore, the X-ray contrast agent is useful for inspecting blood vessel structures and new blood vessels in a tumor, and obtaining perfusion images. In addition, gold provides better visibility than iodine when used in an X-ray contrast agent. Therefore, better x-ray images can be obtained using the X-ray contrast agent containing gold nanoparticles.

An x-ray collimator for use primarily in x-ray lithography for semiconductor fabrication provides a multi-channel collimator to produce a series of collimated beams from an x-ray source. Each channel in the array gathers photons from a small solid angle of the x-ray source and employs at least two pairs of orthogonal spherical mirrors in grazing incidence to produce a collimated beam. An array of flat mirrors steer the collimated beams into a slightly converging geometry. A beam assembler then combines the beams to create a single, large collimated beam that can be used to expose the die.

The purpose of the present invention is to provide an X-ray absorbing fluorescent nanoparticle that is a bimodal contrast agent by which cancer or the like can be specifically contrasted with X-ray and which can act as a highly sensitive fluorescent labeling and, therefore, enables real-time detection without a need for using an expensive PET contrast. Provided are an X-ray absorbing fluorescent composite nanoparticle, said X-ray absorbing fluorescent composite nanoparticle being composed of an X-ray absorbing nanoparticle and fluorescent nanoparticles bonded thereto and having a volume-average particle diameter of 10-1000 nm inclusive, and an X-ray contrast agent comprising the aforesaid X-ray absorbing fluorescent composite nanoparticle.

The 135.000 European SMEs of the mechanical transmission sector producers of gears and gearing products rely on traditional technologies and are characterised by a general conservatism. However over the years the end products in which the gears are used have become more complex and are pushing the state of the art in new technology. Thus the requirement for more sophisticated and reliable gears become extremely important. The gear industry has to implement major changes in gear design and gear fabrication techniques just to keep up with the changing needs of the end product. Moreover, the output of mechanical engineering equipment is growing much faster in China than in the Europe or USA. China is thus becoming a serious competitor for the European SMEs of the sector. In line with the strategic objectives of the associations of manufacturers of gears and mechanical transmission systems, the objective of X-Gear is the diffusion and the standardisation of novel technologies and new materials for a new generation of gears characterised by higher accuracy, resistance, reliability, and tribology properties. In this context X-GEAR plays a role in the competitiveness of European industry since aims to comply with the tighter and tighter requirements being put on the gear industry for lighter weight, higher torque transmissions and quieter, more efficient gear trains. Research activities will be focused on an innovative combination of: - New surface treatments based on Flame Spraying, PVD and Laser Shot Peening; - New materials based on nanopowders (namely ultradispersed fine diamonds) for the production of ultra-resistant gears; - Manufacturing and design tools and knowledge platform implementing guidelines and best practices developed in the project, for a wider diffusion of the project results to the IAGs and their members

The World Wide Web Consortium's main role is to standardize Web technologies by creating and managing Working Groups that produce specifications (called 'Recommendations') that describe the building blocks of the Web, and produce them freely available to all, as part of the Web open platform.The goal of WS2 is to support the W3C in administering its Web services related standard activities, their wide adoption in the European industry, and their evolution toward achieving efficient and interoperable communications within distributed software, as well as rich and complex interactions, exploring use of Semantic Web technologies.WS2 includes European outreach activities on existing W3C Recommendations and fostering the development of new specifications with significant European participation.The project is led by the W3C European branch, hosted by ERCIM, the European Research Consortium for Informatics and Mathematics.The impact foreseen for this project is that it will enable a wider range of use, from business processes to collaboration tools, of the current generation of machine-to-machine Web Services interaction, as well as promoting the extension of these technologies based on new requirements from the industry, using recent and open technology like W3C Semantic Web technologies.The WS2 outreach activities will increase awareness and visibility of W3C's Web services specifications within Europe and strive to make this W3C work on Web services among the most visible areas of W3C's work in Europe.The WS2 technical activities, done through its European staff, will provide European research and industry with competent partners within the W3C community, providing guidance with the standardisation processes currently in place at W3C through its working groups, studying the state of the art and monitoring the other standardisation activities in the domain (e.g. OASIS), and helping to raise the level of European participation.

A writing apparatus includes a unit storing writing data, a unit which acquires pattern information on patterns defined in the data, a unit which generates a table where each pattern information corresponds to a number of times each pattern information is used, for each predetermined region, a unit which generates a Huffman tree, based on the table, a unit which generates another table where each pattern information corresponds to a variable length binary code generated by encoding each pattern information such that the larger the number of times each pattern information is used, the smaller a value of the code, based on the tree, a unit which produces converted data, which is defined by the data, in the region into a predetermined format using the code, based on the other table, and a unit which writes the patterns defined, onto a workpiece, based on the converted data in the region.

Methods and apparatus are provided for controlling writing and reading of data in an array of A storage fields of a probe-based data storage device in which data is written to and read from the array of storage fields by a corresponding array of probes. One method provides error-tolerance by exploiting the inherent parallelism of the probe storage array. A user data block to be written to the A-field array is first coded to produce a plurality of C-byte codewords, such that r·C=k1A where r is the number of codewords and k1 is an integer greater than or equal to 1. A sub-blocks of k1 bytes are produced from the codewords by selecting successive bytes of each sub-block cyclically from the r codewords. The A sub-blocks are then written via respective probes to the corresponding storage fields of the storage field array.