Drive systems for surgical instruments

In various embodiments, an assembly for clamping and stapling patient tissue is disclosed. The assembly comprises a housing, a shaft extending from the housing, and an end effector extending from the shaft. The end effector comprises a staple cartridge comprising a plurality of staples stored therein and an anvil configured to deform the staples. The assembly further comprises a first rotary drive mechanism configured to change a distance between the staple cartridge and the anvil at a first rate during a first complete clamping cycle and a second rotary drive mechanism configured to change the distance between the staple cartridge and the anvil at a second rate during another complete clamping cycle, wherein the second rotary drive mechanism is further configured to affect the another complete clamping cycle independent of the first rotary drive mechanism.

Surgical instruments with E-beam driver and rotary drive arrangements

A surgical system that includes a surgical end effector that has a first jaw and a second jaw, wherein one of the first and second jaws is movable between open and closed positions. A firing member is axially movable between a starting position and an ending position and is configured to slidably engage each of the first and second jaws. A firing drive member interfaces with a rotary output member, such that rotation of the rotary output member about a first rotary output axis imparts a firing motion to the firing member.

Methods for depositing silicon oxide

The embodiments herein focus on plasma enhanced atomic layer deposition (PEALD) processes. Conventional PEALD techniques result in films having high quality at the bottom and top of a feature, but low quality on the sidewalls. The disclosed embodiments achieve more uniform film quality as evidenced by more uniform wet etch rates and electrical properties throughout the film. The disclosed embodiments may use one or more of a relatively high deposition temperature, a relatively high RF power for generating the plasma, and/or relatively long RF plasma exposure duration during each cycle of the PEALD reaction.

Conditioning remote plasma source for enhanced performance having repeatable etch and deposition rates

Embodiments of the present disclosure generally relate to methods for conditioning an interior wall surface of a remote plasma generator. In one embodiment, a method for processing a substrate is provided. The method includes exposing an interior wall surface of a remote plasma source to a conditioning gas that is in excited state to passivate the interior wall surface of the remote plasma source, wherein the remote plasma source is coupled through a conduit to a processing chamber in which a substrate is disposed, and the conditioning gas comprises an oxygen-containing gas, a nitrogen-containing gas, or a combination thereof. The method has been observed to be able to improve dissociation/recombination rate and plasma coupling efficiency in the processing chamber, and therefore provides repeatable and stable plasma source performance from wafer to wafer.

Semiconductor device and method for fabricating the same

Provided are methods for fabricating semiconductor devices. The methods for fabricating the semiconductor devices may include forming a first interlayer insulation film including a trench on a substrate, forming a high-k layer along an inner sidewall and a bottom surface of the trench, forming a first work function control film including impurities along the high-k layer, removing the impurities from the first work function control film to reduce surface resistance of the first work function control film by about 30% to about 60% and forming a gate metal in the trench.

SECURE PROCESSING OF DATA

Systems, methods, and machine-interpretable data representing executable instruction sets and/or other products for the processing of data for the secure creation, administration, manipulation, processing, and storage of electronic data useful in the processing of payment transactions and other secure data processes. Some embodiments provides secure means for the authorization of sensitive and other data processes subject to controlled access. Such processes include the creation, administration, authorization, virtualization, storage, and other manipulation or processing of electronic data representing characteristics of, instructions for, and information associated with consumer, business, and other payment accounts, and other forms of secure payment elements, such as payment tokens; and data useful in processing transactions using such accounts and elements. Information associated with particular payment means, such as accounts or payment tokens, can be stored in a data set, usually secure, sometimes referred to as a virtual or electronic wallet, or a secure payment token.

Low-K dielectric gapfill by flowable deposition

Methods are described for forming a flowable low-k dielectric layer on a patterned substrate. The film may be a silicon-carbon-oxygen (Si—C—O) layer in which the silicon and carbon constituents come from a silicon and carbon containing precursor while the oxygen may come from an oxygen-containing precursor activated in a remote plasma region. A similarly deposited silicon oxide layer may be deposited first to improve the gapfill capabilities. Alternatively, or in combination, the flow of a silicon-and-carbon-containing precursor may be reduced during deposition to change the properties from low-k to high strength roughly following the filling of features of the patterned substrate.

System and method for indicia verification

An indicia-verification system acquires video and analyzes the video to determine whether it contains any images of an indicia that are of sufficient quality to merit the initiation of indicia verification. If the video is of sufficient quality, the system acquires a high resolution still image of the indicia. If the still image is of sufficient quality, an indicia-analysis subsystem performs indicia verification on the still image of the indicia.

Systems and methods for improving deposition rate uniformity and reducing defects in substrate processing systems

Systems and methods for delivering liquid precursor in a substrate processing system include supplying liquid precursor using a first valve in fluid communication with a liquid precursor source; supplying purge gas using a second valve in fluid communication with a purge gas source; arranging a third valve having a first input port in fluid communication with an output port of the first valve and a second input port in fluid communication with an output port of the second valve; arranging an input port of a first divert injector valve in fluid communication with an output port of the third valve; and operating the first valve, the second valve, the third valve and the first divert injector valve in first, second, third and fourth modes.

Timbre constancy across a range of directivities for a loudspeaker

A system and method for driving a loudspeaker array across directivities and frequencies to maintain timbre constancy in a listening area is described. In one embodiment, a frequency independent room constant describing the listening area is determined using the directivity index of a first beam pattern, the direct-to-reverberant ratio DR at the listener's location in the listening area, and an estimated reverberation time T60 for the listening area at a designated frequency. On the basis of this room constant, an offset may be generated for a second beam pattern. The offset describes the decibel difference between first and second beam patterns to achieve constant timbre and may be used to adjust the second beam pattern at multiple frequencies. Maintaining constant timbre improves audio quality regardless of the characteristics of the listening area and the beam patterns used to represent sound program content. Other embodiments are also described.