Author: claimsbot

1. A memory card connector, adapted for signal transference between a memory card and a main board, comprising:
an insulative frame having a housing and lateral sides, a plurality of passageways being defined in the housing and receiving conductive terminals therein, an assembling groove being defined in the housing;
a slide guiding mechanism assembled on the assembling groove, including:
a sliding bar and a guiding bar, the sliding bar defining a guiding groove which has insertion course and ejection course, a link portion being formed on an end of the sliding bar, the guiding bar having a second guiding end retained on the insulative frame, and a first guiding end moving relative to the guiding groove with the sliding bar; and
a resilient element mounted on the sliding bar and close to the link portion for providing return force for the sliding bar;

a driving member arranged at an end of the sliding bar and opposite the link portion and having a pushing portion and a drawing portion; and
a driven member corresponding to the driving member and having a pushed portion and a drawn portion, the driven member cooperating with a stop member to control abutting against the memory card,
wherein, when the memory card is located in a working state, the first guiding end of the guiding bar engages a positioning portion of the guiding groove, and a free end of the driven member engaging a cutout of the memory card, and
wherein, when the memory card is located in a working state, a first conductor is electrically connected to a second conductor.
2. The memory card connector as claimed in claim 1, wherein the driving member includes an extending arm integrated with the sliding bar, an oval first link groove being defined in the extending arm, the pushing portion being located in a side of the first link groove, and the drawing portion being located in another side of the first link groove.
3. The memory card connector as claimed in claim 2, wherein the driven member is a wire, and wherein the driven member has a driven end bending generally at 90 degree for extending into the first link groove, the pushed portion being located on a side of the driven end and the drawn portion being located on another side of the driven end, and the free end opposite the driven end, offsetting and bending approximately at 90 degree.
4. The memory card connector as claimed in claim 3, wherein the stop member is a second link groove which is defined in the insulative frame and includes a straight section and an arc section for allowing the free end of the driven member extending therein in such a way that with movement of the pushed portion and the drawn portion of the driven member, the free end moving along the straight section and the arc section controls abutting against the memory card.
5. The memory card connector as claimed in claim 1, further comprising a shell assembled on a side of the insulative frame and shielding the housing, a stop sheet being formed on the shell for abutting against the guiding bar, and a stop plate being formed on the shell for abutting against the driven member.
6. The memory card connector as claimed in claim 1, wherein the guiding groove is heart-like, and wherein the positioning portion is recessed in the guiding groove for providing working state of the memory card.
7. A memory card connector, adapted to communicate with a circuit system for signal transference between a memory card and a main board, comprising:
an insulative frame having a housing and lateral sides, a plurality of passageways being defined in the housing and receiving conductive terminals therein, an assembling groove being defined in the housing;
a slide guiding mechanism assembled on the assembling groove, including:
a sliding bar and a guiding bar, the sliding bar defining a guiding groove which has insertion course and ejection course, a link portion being formed on an end of the sliding bar, the guiding bar having a second guiding end retained on the insulative frame and communicating with an end of a detecting circuit of the circuit system, and a first guiding end moving relative to the guiding groove with movement of the sliding bar; and
a resilient element mounted on the sliding bar and close to the link portion for providing return force for the sliding bar;

a first conductor including a contact arm received in the assembling groove, and a soldering arm communicating with another end of the detecting circuit of the circuit system; and
a second conductor provided on the sliding bar, and including a first contact portion and a second contact portion, the first contact portion being located at a positioning portion of the guiding groove and contacting the first guiding end of the guiding bar at the positioning portion, the second conductor contacting or departing from the contact arm of the first conductor with movement of the sliding bar,
wherein, when the memory card is located in a working state, the first guiding end of the guiding bar engages the positioning portion of the guiding groove, and a free end of a driven member engaging a cutout of the memory card, and
wherein, when the memory card is located in a working state, the first conductor is electrically connected to the second conductor.
8. The memory card connector as claimed in claim 7, wherein the soldering arm of the first conductor bends for surface mounting, and wherein the contact arm of the first conductor corresponds to the soldering arm and is cantilevered.
9. The memory card connector as claimed in claim 7, wherein the first contact portion of the second conductor bends approximately at 90 degree for inserting into the positioning portion of the guiding groove, and wherein the second contact portion of the second conductor is generally planar.
10. The memory card connector as claimed in claim 9, wherein the sliding bar defines a slot adjacent the guiding groove for assembling the second contact portion of the second conductor.
11. A memory card connector, adapted to communicate with a circuit system for signal transference between a memory card and a main board, comprising:
an insulative frame having a housing and lateral sides, a plurality of passageways being defined in the housing and receiving conductive terminals therein, an assembling groove and a stop member being defined in the housing;
a slide guiding mechanism assembled on the assembling groove, including:
a sliding bar defining a guiding groove which has insertion course and ejection course, a link portion being formed on an end of the sliding bar, a driving member being arranged at another end of the sliding bar and having a pushing portion and a drawing portion, a driven member corresponding to the driving member and having a pushed portion and a drawn portion, the driven member cooperating with the stop member to control abutting against the memory card;
a guiding bar having a second guiding end retained on the insulative frame, and a first guiding end moving relative to the guiding groove with the sliding bar; and
a resilient element mounted on the sliding bar and close to the link portion for providing return force for the sliding bar;

a shell assembled on a side of the insulative frame for shielding the housing, and communicating with an end of the detecting circuit of the circuit system, a stop sheet being formed on the shell for abutting against the guiding bar; and
a second conductor provided on the sliding bar, communicating with another end of the detecting circuit of the circuit system, and including a first contact portion at a positioning portion of the guiding groove, ejection of the memory card being detected when the guiding bar departs from the first contact portion with movement of the sliding bar,
wherein, when the memory card is located in a working state, the first guiding end of the guiding bar engages the positioning portion of the guiding groove, and a free end of the driven member engaging a cutout of the memory card, and
wherein, when the memory card is located in a working state, a first conductor is electrically connected to the second conductor.
12. The memory card connector as claimed in claim 11, wherein the driving member includes an extending arm integrated with the sliding bar, an oval first link groove being defined in the extending arm, the pushing portion being located in a side of the first link groove, and the drawing portion being located in another side of the first link groove, and wherein the driven member is a wire, and has a the driven end bending generally at 90 degree for extending into the first link groove, and the free end is located opposite the driven end and offsetting and bending approximately at 90 degree, the pushed portion being located on a side of the driven end, and the drawn portion being located on another side of the driven end.
13. The memory card connector as claimed in claim 12, wherein the stop member is a second link groove which is defined in the insulative frame and includes a straight section and an arc section for allowing the free end of the driven member extending therein in such a way that, with movement of the pushed portion and the drawn portion, the free end moving along the straight section and the arc section controls abutting against the memory card.
14. The memory card connector as claimed in claim 11, wherein the first contact portion of the second conductor bends approximately at 90 degree for inserting into the positioning portion of the guiding groove.
15. The memory card connector as claimed in claim 11, wherein the guiding groove is heart-like, and wherein the positioning portion is recessed in the guiding groove for providing working state of the memory card.
16. A memory card connector, adapted to communicate with a circuit system for signal transference between a memory card and a main board, comprising:
an insulative frame having a housing and lateral sides, a plurality of passageways being defined in the housing and receiving conductive terminals therein, an assembling groove being defined in the housing;
a slide guiding mechanism assembled on the assembling groove, including:
a sliding bar and a guiding bar, the sliding bar defining a guiding groove with insertion course and ejection course, a link portion being formed on an end of the sliding bar, the guiding bar having a second guiding end retained on the insulative frame, and a first guiding end moving relative to the guiding groove with the sliding bar; and
a resilient element mounted on the sliding bar and close to the link portion for providing return force for the sliding bar;

a shell assembled on a side of the insulative frame for shielding the housing, and communicating with an end of a detecting circuit of the circuit system, at least a stop sheet being formed on the shell for abutting against the guiding bar; and
a second conductor provided on the sliding bar, communicating with another end of the detecting circuit of the circuit system, and including a first contact portion at a positioning portion of the guiding groove, ejection of the memory card being detected when the guiding bar departs from the first contact portion with movement of the sliding bar,
wherein, when the memory card is located in a working state, the first guiding end of the guiding bar engages the positioning portion of the guiding groove, and a free end of a driven member engaging a cutout of the memory card, and
wherein, when the memory card is located in a working state, a first conductor is electrically connected to the second conductor.

The claims below are in addition to those above.
All refrences to claim(s) which appear below refer to the numbering after this setence.

What is claimed is:

1. An emergency call system comprising:
a vehicle interface unit for receiving inputs of a vehicle speed pulse indicating a speed of a vehicle and signals including a status signal indicating a status of a key of the vehicle;
a data transmission unit for transmitting information indicating a status of the vehicle to one of a HELP center provided outside the vehicle and a registered portable phone, and for receiving a control signal transmitted from one of the HELP center and the registered portable phone to set a status of the vehicle;
a GPS reception and gyro sensor unit for detecting a current vehicle location;
an operation interface for locally receiving the control signal for setting the status of the vehicle;
a display unit for displaying the status of the vehicle;
an arithmetic and control unit connected to said vehicle interface unit, said data transmission unit, said operation interface, said display unit and said GPS reception and gyro sensor unit, and provided with a memory for storing a program or data controlling said vehicle interface unit, said data transmission unit, said operation interface, said display unit and said GPS reception and gyro sensor unit, wherein
said arithmetic control unit receives the control signal via one of said data transmission unit and said operation interface so as to set one of a drive mode and a theft prevention mode in the vehicle, accordingly checks an ID of a user, a frequency of trials for verifying the ID, a current vehicle location and a status of a door of the vehicle, and generates information related to the theft when it is determined that the vehicle is stolen, thus sending the information to one of the HELP center and the portable phone via said data transmission unit and displaying the information in said display unit.
2. The emergency call system according to claim 1, said arithmetic and control unit in the drive mode verifies the ID when the door of the vehicle is open and executes the steps of:
detecting a current vehicle location via said GPS reception and gyro sensor unit when the ID is successfully verified so as to store the detected current vehicle location;
detecting the current vehicle location via said GPS reception and gyro sensor unit when the ID is not verified, thus determining, when there is a difference between data relating to a previous vehicle location stored in the memory and data relating to the current vehicle location, that the vehicle is stolen, and stores, when there is no difference, the data relating to the current vehicle location in the memory; and
counting the frequency of trials for verifying the ID and determining, when the count exceeds a predetermined level, that the vehicle is stolen so as to notify one of the HELP center and the portable phone accordingly via said data transmission unit; wherein
said arithmetic and control unit in the theft prevention mode determines that the vehicle is stolen, when the door of the vehicle is closed and when there is a difference between the data relating to the current vehicle location detected via said GPS reception and gyro sensor unit and the data relating to the previous vehicle location stored in the memory, so as to notify one of the HELP center and the portable phone accordingly via said data transmission unit; and wherein
said arithmetic and control unit in the theft prevention mode verifies the ID when the door of the vehicle is open, and executes the steps of:
detecting a current vehicle location via said GPS reception and gyro sensor unit when the ID is successfully verified so as to store the detected current vehicle location;
detecting the current vehicle location via said GPS reception and gyro sensor unit when the ID is not verified, thus determining, when there is a difference between data relating to a previous vehicle location stored in the memory and data relating to the current vehicle location, that the vehicle is stolen, and stores, when there is no difference, the data relating to the current vehicle location in the memory; and
counting the frequency of trials for verifying the ID and determining, when the count exceeds a predetermined level, that the vehicle is stolen so as to notify one of the HELP center and the portable phone accordingly via said data transmission unit.

1-14. (canceled)
15. A method of quantifying a target nucleic acid sequence in a sample, comprising the steps of:
(a) contacting the sample with a first amplification oligonucleotide, specific for a first portion of the target nucleic acid sequence, under conditions allowing hybridization of the first amplification oligonucleotide to the first portion of the target nucleic acid sequence, thereby generating a pre-amplification hybrid that comprises the first amplification oligonucleotide and the target nucleic acid sequence;
(b) isolating the pre-amplification hybrid by target capture onto a solid support followed by washing to remove any of the first amplification oligonucleotide that did not hybridize to the first portion of the target nucleic acid sequence in step (a);
(c) amplifying, in a first phase amplification reaction mixture, at least a portion of the target nucleic acid sequence of the pre-amplification hybrid isolated in step (b) in a first phase, substantially isothermal, transcription-associated amplification reaction under conditions that support linear amplification thereof, but do not support exponential amplification thereof, thereby resulting in a reaction mixture comprising a first amplification product,
wherein the first phase amplification reaction mixture comprises a second amplification oligonucleotide, the second amplification oligonucleotide being complementary to a portion of an extension product of the first amplification oligonucleotide and wherein the second amplification oligonucleotide is not enzymatically extended in the first phase of isothermal transcription-associated amplification reaction, and
wherein the first amplification product is not a template for nucleic acid synthesis during the first phase, substantially isothermal, transcription-associated amplification reaction;

(d) combining the reaction mixture comprising the first amplification product with at least one component that participates in exponential amplification of the first amplification product, but that is lacking from the reaction mixture comprising the first amplification product, to produce a second phase amplification reaction mixture,
wherein the second phase amplification reaction mixture additionally comprises a sequence-specific hybridization probe;

(e) performing, in a second phase, substantially isothermal, transcription-associated amplification reaction in the second phase amplification reaction mixture, an exponential amplification of the first amplification product, thereby synthesizing a second amplification product;
(f) detecting, with the sequence-specific hybridization probe at regular time intervals, synthesis of the second amplification product in the second phase amplification reaction mixture; and
(g) quantifying the target nucleic acid sequence in the sample using results from step (f).
16. The method of claim 15, wherein the first amplification oligonucleotide comprises a 3\u2032 target specific sequence and a 5\u2032 promoter sequence for an RNA polymerase.
17. The method of claim 15, wherein the RNA polymerase is T7 RNA polymerase.
18. The method of claim 15, wherein the solid support comprises an immobilized capture probe.
19. The method of claim 15,
wherein step (a) further comprises contacting the sample with a target capture oligonucleotide that hybridizes to the target nucleic acid sequence, and
wherein the pre-amplification hybrid comprises the target nucleic acid sequence hybridized to each of the target capture oligonucleotide and the first amplification oligonucleotide.
20. The method of claim 15, wherein the solid support comprises magnetically attractable particles.
21. The method of claim 15, wherein each of the first and second phase isothermal transcription-associated amplification reactions comprise an RNA polymerase and a reverse transcriptase.
22. The method of claim 15, wherein the at least one component comprises the first amplification oligonucleotide.
23. The method of claim 15, wherein the first amplification product of step (c) is a cDNA molecule with the same polarity as the target nucleic acid sequence in the sample, and wherein the second amplification product of step (e) is an RNA molecule.
24. The method of claim 15, wherein the sequence-specific hybridization probe in step (d) is a conformation-sensitive probe that produces a detectable signal when hybridized to the second amplification product.
25. The method of claim 15, wherein the sequence-specific hybridization probe in step (d) is a fluorescently labeled sequence-specific hybridization probe.
26. The method of claim 15, wherein step (g) comprises quantifying the target nucleic acid sequence in the sample using a linear calibration curve and results from step (f).
27. The method of claim 15, wherein step (c) comprises amplifying by 10-fold to 10,000-fold, in the first phase amplification reaction mixture.
28. The method of claim 15, wherein the second amplification oligonucleotide comprises a blocked 3\u2032 terminus.

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 sigma-delta analog-to-digital converter comprising:
a sigma-delta feedback loop of the sigma-delta analog-to-digital converter;
a variable gain amplifier within the sigma-delta feedback loop; and
an attenuator within the sigma-delta feedback loop.
2. The sigma-delta analog-to-digital converter of claim 1 wherein the sigma-delta feedback loop comprises a loop filter, a quantizer, a loop digital-to-analog converter and a summer, the variable gain amplifier positioned prior to the quantizer and after the summer.
3. (canceled)
4. The sigma-delta analog-to-digital converter of claim 1 wherein the attenuator is operable to attenuate by an attenuation factor and the amplifier is operable to amplify by an amplification factor, the attentuation factor equal to the amplification factor.
5. The sigma-delta analog-to-digital converter of claim 1 further comprising:
an output from the sigma-delta feedback loop;
a processor operable to receive signals on the output and operable to vary a gain of the variable gain amplifier in response to the signals.
6. The sigma-delta analog-to-digital converter of claim 5 wherein the sigma-delta feedback loop comprises a continuous-time sigma-delta loop and wherein the processor is operable to automatically control the gain.
7. The sigma-delta analog-to-digital converter of claim 1 wherein the variable gain amplifier is operable to amplify an output of the sigma-delta analog-to-digital converter, the attenuator operable to attenuate feedback signals for combination with signal input to the sigma-delta analog-to-digital converter prior to amplification by the variable gain amplifier.
8. A signal path with automatic gain control, the signal path comprising:
an analog device;
a sigma-delta analog-to-digital converter coupled with the analog device, the sigma-delta analog-to-digital converter having a sigma-delta feedback loop, an attenuator and a variable gain amplifier within the sigma-delta feedback loop.
9. The signal path of claim 8 wherein the sigma-delta analog-to-digital converter comprises a loop filter, a quantizer, a loop digital-to-analog converter and a summer, the variable gain amplifier positioned prior to the quantizer and after the summers and the attenuator is positioned after the loop digital-to-analog converter and before the summer.
10. The signal path of claim 9 wherein the variable gain amplifier is positioned after the loop filter.
11. (canceled)
12. The signal path of claim 8 wherein the attenuator is operable to attenuate by an attenuation factor and the amplifier is operable to amplify by an amplification factor, the attentuation factor equal to the amplification factor.
13. The signal path of claim 8 further comprising:
an output from the sigma-delta feedback loop;
a processor operable to receive signals on the output and operable to vary a gain of the variable gain amplifier and an attenuation of the attenuator in response to the signals.
14. The signal path of claim 8 wherein the variable gain amplifier is operable to amplify an output of the signal path, the attenuator is operable to attenuate feedback signals for combination with signals input to the signal path prior to amplification by the variable gain amplifier.
15. The signal path of claim 8 further comprising:
at least one of a LNA or an additional variable gain amplifier prior to the sigma-delta analog-to-digital converter, the one operable to partially amplify and the variable gain amplifier operable to partially amplify within the signal path.
16. The signal path of claim 8 wherein the analog device comprises a mixer, further comprising:
a filter between the mixer and the sigma-delta analog-to-digital converter; and
an adjustable gain amplifier between the filter and the sigma-delta analog-to-digital converter.
17. The signal path of claim 8 comprising a mobile telephone receiver.
18. A method for automatically controlling gain with a sigma-delta analog-to-digital converter, the method comprising:
(a) converting analog signals to digital signals with a quantizer of the sigma-delta analog-to-digital converter; and
(b) scaling the digital signals output by the quantizer inside the sigma-delta analog-to-digital converter;
wherein (a) comprises quantizing and summing a sigma-delta feedback signal with input analog signals, and wherein (b) comprises the amplifying and attenuating the sigma-delta feedback signal as a function of the amplification prior to quantizing.
19. The method of claim 18 wherein (b) comprises scaling inside a low-pass or band-pass continuous-time sigma-delta loop.
20. The method of claim 18 wherein (a) comprises quantizing the analog signals, and wherein (b) comprises amplifying the analog signals prior to the quantizing.
21. (canceled)
22. A method for automatically controlling gain with a sigma-delta analog-to-digital converter, the method comprising:
(a) converting analog signals to digital signals with a quantizer of the sigma-delta analogy-to-digital converter;
(b) scaling the digital signals output by the quantizer inside the sigma-delta analog-to-digital converter; and
(c) adjusting the scaling of (b) as a function of the digital signals output by the sigma-delta analog-to-digital converter.
23. The method of claim 22 wherein (b) and (c) comprise automatically controlling gain in a receive path, the receive path including the sigma-delta analog-to-digital converter.
24. The sigma-delta analog-to-digital converter of claim 1 further comprising:
a single digital-to-analog converter in the sigma-delta feedback loop.
25. The sigma-delta analog-to-digital converter of claim 1 further comprising:
a single loop filter in the sigma-delta feedback loop.
26. The signal path of claim 8 wherein the sigma-delta feedback loop includes a single digital-to-analog converter.
27. The signal path of claim 8 wherein the sigma-delta feedback loop includes a single loop filter.
28. The method of claim 18 further comprising:
filtering with a signal loop filter in a sigma-delta feedback loop.
29. The method of claim 18 further comprising:
converting the digital signals with a single digital-to-analog converter.
30. A sigma-delta analog-to-digital converter comprising:
a sigma-delta feedback loop;
a variable gain amplifier within the sigma-delta feedback loop; and
a single digital-to-analog converter in the sigma-delta feedback loop.
31. A sigma-delta analog-to-digital converter comprising:
a sigma-delta feedback loop;
a variable gain amplifier within the sigma-delta feedback loop; and
a single loop filter in the sigma-delta feedback loop.