1. A method for separating particulate matter from a fluid in which the particulate matter is suspended, the method comprising:
feeding a fluid containing particulate matter into a chamber of a vessel through an inlet, the chamber being at least partially bounded by a peripheral wall and the chamber also communicating with a first outlet and a second outlet;
rotating the vessel about a rotational axis extending through the vessel such that at least a portion of the particulate matter settles out of the fluid and against at least a portion of the peripheral wall of the vessel;
disturbing at least a portion of the particulate matter settled against the peripheral wall so that at least a portion of the particulate matter settled against the peripheral wall is resuspended within the fluid;
removing at least a portion of the fluid having the resuspended particulate matter therein from the vessel through the first outlet; and
removing through the second outlet of the vessel the fluid from which the particulate material has settled out.
2. The method according to claim 1, wherein the act of disturbing at least a portion of the particulate matter settled against the peripheral wall comprises delivering a stream of a removal fluid into the rotating vessel at or adjacent to the peripheral wall.
3. The method according to claim 2, wherein the removal fluid comprises a liquid.
4. The method according to claim 1, further comprising closing the second outlet during removal of the fluid through the first outlet.
5. The method according to claim 1, further comprising closing the first outlet and the second outlet for a time period between removing the fluid through the first outlet and removing the fluid through the second outlet.
6. The method according to claim 1, wherein the act of feeding includes introducing a heavy fluid component and a light fluid component into the chamber of the vessel.
7. The method according to claim 1, wherein the act of removing at least a portion of the fluid having the resuspended particulate matter therein comprises removing the fluid having the resuspended particulate matter therein through an extraction tube having an opening to receive the fluid at or adjacent to the peripheral wall, the extraction tube bounding or communicating with the first outlet.
8. The method according to claim 7, wherein the act of disturbing at least a portion of the particulate matter comprises delivering a removal fluid to the vessel through a supply duct formed in the extraction tube, the fluid having the resuspended particulate matter therein being removed through a removal duct in the extraction tube.
9. The method according to claim 8, wherein one of the supply duct and removal duct is disposed within the other.
10. The method according to claim 7, wherein the act of disturbing at least a portion of the particulate matter comprising delivering a removal fluid to the vessel through the extraction tube.
11. The method according to claim 1, further comprising pressurizing the fluid within the chamber in a range between about 15 psi to about 600 psi.
12. The method according to claim 1, wherein a plurality of spaced apart fins are disposed within the chamber of the vessel, the fins bounding a plurality of fluid channels that extend between the inlet and the second outlet, the fluid being fed into the chamber of the vessel such that at least a portion of the fluid passes through the fluid channels.
13. The method according to claim 12, wherein a disc outwardly projects from toward the rotational axis to toward the peripheral wall, the disc intersecting with each of the plurality of fins, the fluid being fed into the chamber such that fluid is forced to travel around an outer perimeter of the disc.
14. The method according to claim 12, wherein a disc outwardly projects from toward the rotational axis to toward the peripheral wall, the disc intersecting with each of the plurality of fins and the disc having a plurality of openings extending therethrough, the fluid being fed into the chamber such that at least a portion of fluid passes through the openings in the disc.
15. The method according to claim 12, wherein an opening is formed in each fin such that an annular fluid equalizing channel provides fluid communication between each of the areas bounded by the fins, the fluid being fed into the chamber of the vessel such that at least a portion of the fluid travels within the fluid equalizing channel.
16. The method according to claim 1, wherein the inlet and at least one of the first outlet and the second outlet encircles the rotational axis or has the rotational axis extending therethrough.
17. The method according to claim 1, wherein the act of disturbing at least a portion of the particulate matter comprises delivering a removal fluid to the vessel through a supply duct and wherein the act of removing at least a portion of the fluid having the resuspended particulate matter therein comprises removing the fluid having the resuspended particulate matter therein through a removal duct.
18. The method according to claim 1, wherein the chamber also communicates with a third outlet and a fourth outlet.
The claims below are in addition to those above.
All refrences to claim(s) which appear below refer to the numbering after this setence.
1. A method of generating a modular one-way function in a device and thereby producing a random-value stream for use in a device that can benefit from a random-value stream, comprising:
a) providing a plurality of edit modules each configured to transform values;
b) indexing the plurality of edit modules;
c) providing an instruction stream, wherein the instruction stream includes a random-value stream resulting from a one-way function;
d) providing a value stream, including a series of values;
e) selecting a value from the value stream, thereby generating a selected value;
f) selecting, by use of a computing device, one of the plurality of edit modules according to a logical association between an instruction stream value and the index;
g) transforming the selected value to a transformed value by operation of the selected edit module;
h) repeating steps e), f) and g) thereby generating a random-value stream.
2. The method of claim 1, wherein the plurality of edit modules includes a function and associated seed vector and further comprising the step of incrementing the seed vector when the function is utilized to transform the selected value.
3. The method of claim 1, wherein the plurality of edit modules includes only functions and associated seed vectors and further comprises the step of incrementing each associated seed vector when each function is utilized to transform the selected value.
4. The method of claim 1, wherein the step of indexing includes assigning each of the plurality of edit modules a memory cell addressed according to a domain value wherein any given domain value maps to all possible range values.
5. The method of claim 1, wherein the instruction stream is an output of steps a) through f) performed by a different module.
6. The method of claim 1, wherein one of the edit modules comprises performance of steps a) through f) by a different module.
7. The method of claim 1, further comprising the step of restricting the selectable edit modules to a smaller subset of the total pool of available edit modules.
8. The method of claim 7, wherein the step of restricting includes randomly selecting a limited number of edit modules thereby generating a subset and generating data sufficient to limit selection of edit modules to those of the subset.
9. The method of claim 1, further comprising repeating step f) to select a second edit module and transforming the transformed value by operation of the second edit module thereby forming a multi-transformed value by operation of stacked edit modules.
10. A computer-readable medium having computer-executable instructions for performing a method of using a device to generate a random-value stream, the instructions comprising the steps of:
a) providing a plurality of edit modules each configured to transform values;
b) indexing the plurality of edit modules;
c) providing an instruction stream, wherein the instruction stream includes a random-value stream resulting from a one-way function;
d) providing a value stream, including a series of values;
e) selecting a value from the value stream, thereby generating a selected value;
f) selecting, by use of a computing device, one of the plurality of edit modules according to a logical association between an instruction stream value and the index;
g) transforming the selected value to a transformed value by operation of the selected edit module;
h) repeating steps e), f) and g) thereby generating a random-value stream.
11. The medium of claim 10, wherein the plurality of edit modules includes a function and associated seed vector and further comprising the step of incrementing the seed vector when the function is utilized to transform a value.
12. The medium of claim 10, wherein the plurality of edit modules includes only functions and associated seed vectors and further comprises the step of incrementing each associated seed vector when each function is utilized to transform a value.
13. The medium of claim 10, wherein the step of indexing includes assigning each of the plurality of edit modules a memory cell addressed according to a domain value wherein any given domain value maps to all possible range values.
14. The medium of claim 10, wherein the instruction stream is an output of steps a) through f) performed by a different module.
15. The method of claim 10, wherein one of the edit modules comprises performance of steps a) through f) by a different module.
16. The method of claim 10, further comprising the step of restricting the selectable edit modules to a smaller subset of the total pool of available edit modules.
17. The medium of claim 16, wherein the step of restricting includes randomly selecting a limited number of edit modules thereby generating a subset and generating data sufficient to limit selection of edit modules to those of the subset.
18. The medium of claim 10, further comprising repeating step f) to select a second edit module and transforming the transformed value by operation of the second edit module thereby forming a multi-transformed value by operation of stacked edit modules.
19. A random value generation system configured to automatically generate a stream of random values usable by a device that may benefit from such, the system comprising:
a) a plurality of indexed edit modules each configured to transform values;
b) an instruction stream module configured to provide a random-value stream resulting from a one-way function;
c) a value stream module configured to provide a series of values;
d) a computing device in communication with each of the plurality of indexed edit modules, the instruction stream module, and the value stream module and configured to select one of the plurality of indexed edit modules according to a logical association between a value of the instruction stream and the index and instruct the edit module to transform a selected value of the value stream module.