The technology assessment and forecast program of the United States patent and trademark office

Often overlooked is the wealth of information in patents that makes patents useful to public policy making agencies and corporate management, among others. The source of this information is the bibliographic and classification data associated with each patent. much of which is required by law and hence is extremely accurate. These data serve to fingerprint the increment of technological activity disclosed in a patent. Possible ways of using the data include: — identification of emerging technologies — Monotoring foreign activity — identification of “actors” in the technology — tracking applications and impacts of a technologyThe objective of the technology assessment and forecast program of the United States Patent and Trademark Office is to stimulate the use of the patent file of the Office. The Office of Technology Assessment and Forecast (OTAF), which administers the program has assembled a master data base covering all U.S. patents. It periodically updates this base and adds new data items to it.     

Technological information in the Spanish industrial property office

This article describes the modernization of the technological information activities and services in the Spanish Industrial Property Office. The improvement programmes and services of the Registro de la Propiedad Industrial in connection with technological information ultimately have a number of objectives: to strengthen the domestic substructure on the subject, to promote and satisfy the information demand, to integrate information of all scientific and technological communication, to render the best possible services, to strengthen the diffusion structure by means of different support methods and to offer ways when the time comes, to exceed the conventional information services by providing reports on novelty searches or patent abstracting services. All of this takes place within the framework of the primary sources of information and database and the regional decentralization of the secondary sources.     

The office of technology assessment and forecast industry concordance as a means of identifying industry technology origins

This paper examines the difficulties encountered when one attempts to link patents to data on such variables as R & D expenditures in the industries where the patents originated. A comparative experiment using U.S. OTAF industry assignments based upon patent class codes only and a ‘manual’ procedure using much richer information reveals a high rate of disagreement as to origin industries. Alternative means of obtaining better information on origin industries are considered.     

Evaluating research,technology and development in Canadian industry: Meeting the challenges of industrial innovation

Canadian firms respond to the challenges and opportunities of global competition by increasing their research productivity and the rate of innovation. The competitive edge for Canadian industry must now be based on a new appreciation of the dynamics of R & D, as well as management practices and strategies which are relevant to the systems which underpin innovation. New R & D and management models are being adopted by firms to cope with the dynamic and complex nature of innovation, the growing importance of transactions and linkages within innovation systems and the range of financial, human, social and environmental factors which now impact on technology assessment and decision-making. Given this new paradigm, evaluation techniques are being created and adopted by Canadian industry which provide them with a greater understanding of the value of their research and enhance the agility of their technology management. But, these developments are not confined to industry. Of equal importance is the convergence of evaluation methods used in both industry and governments to assess research and technology. The methods used by industry are now the techniques employed by governments to assess their own R & D and to formulate industrial S & T policies and strategies.     

Evaluating and selecting investments in industrial robots

This paper proposes an alternative methodology for the selection of industrial robots using data envelopment analysis (DEA). It aims at the identification, in a cost/benefit perspective, of the optimal robot, by measuring, for each robot, the relative efficiency through the resolution of linear programming problems. The methodology adopted is based on a sequential dual use of DEA with restricted weights. This approach increases the discriminatory power of standard DEA and makes it possible to achieve a better balancing of robot performances. Further benefits refer to the possibility of extending the use of this approach to various multi-attribute decision-making problems where each performance may depend on a number of factors. An empirical application of the methodology, using data from 12 robot manufacturers, confirms the applicability of revised DEA to advanced manufacturing technology selection, and reinforces its use as a tactical/operational tool in the area of production/operations. In order to evaluate the overall balancing of robot performance indicators, a sensitivity analysis (with variable weight restrictions) is also carried out. The comparison of the results with those obtained by applying cross-efficiency, another DEA-based methodology (Baker and Talluri 1997 Computers and Industrial Engineering , 32 , 101- 108), is also addressed and discussed. Finally, the dual model of DEA has helped to provide a useful economical and technological analysis of the inefficient robots.     

Evaluating capacity and delay given the implementation of ITS technology at truck weight and safety inspection stations

This research presents a simple-to-use simulation model developed to simulate, at the planning level, the activities that occur at a typical roadside weight and safety screening station. The parameters can be modified by the user to simulate a facility with different dimensions and parameters (e.g. longer ramps, more safety inspection bays, a higher rate of vehicle being selected for safety inspection, more or less vehicle failing weight screening at the weigh-in-motion or static scales). The inputs and data requirements for the model are relatively minor and appropriate for planning level analysis     

Practical use of defect assessment procedures for industrial component integrity assessment

Abstract

The practical use of defect assessment procedures for industrial component integrity assessment is described through two practical examples in this paper. In the first example, the procedure is used to perform low temperature fitness-for-service (FFS) analysis of a longitudinal seam welded vessel manufactured from a duplex stainless steel. The impact energy obtained from the Charpy impact test performed on the weld of the vessel was found lower than the value of the minimum impact energy criteria given by the British Standard BS 5500. Charpy impact energy and fracture toughness correlation and failure assessment diagram (FAD) methodology were used in this FFS analysis to determine the fracture resistance of the vessel. For the assumed defect size used in the assessment, the weld was found to meet the fracture resistance criteria and therefore would still be fit-for-purpose. The FAD analysis was, however, repeated using the J-values obtained from the CTOD test to gain better confidence as the Charpy impact test does not provide direct measurement of the fracture toughness. The FAD was later used to determine the critical surface crack length which was then represented as a function of crack depth. The Charpy impact energy correlation method was found to be more conservative than the method of evaluation using the CTOD J-values. The lack of side wall fusion (LOF) which is a typical defect in this type of vessel would usually be influenced by the size/diameter of the electrode wire used in the weld and the number of runs. In this case, the fracture resistance of the 15mm thick vessel with the longitudinal seam weld should be adequate if less than 5mm diameter of electrode wire is used.

The second example illustrates defect assessment of a high temperature plant component. A defect was found in the high pressure final superheater header. A defect assessment incorporating FAD on the header showed that the defect was non-critical. This led to the need to perform creep and fatigue crack growth calculations and remaining life assessment in order to determine the mitigation plan for the engineers. The deterministic approach, which mainly considers the worst case scenario, suggested that the remaining life of the header was approximately 4.5 years. Probabilistic analysis showed that the component could still be fit for service up to 6 years. This will allow the engineers to mitigate a more efficient plan with a decision to either repair or replace the header and when. The use of probabilistic lifing methodologies and algorithms could consequently bring considerable financial benefits to the plant owners/operators e.g. by avoiding premature component repair or replacement. Nevertheless, it would be in the management’s interest to avoid a forced outage. The recommendation would be that the component could still be fit to use until their next minor outage (in 3 years). From then, the remedy option would be to grind down to a depth of suspected crack, excavate a small area/surrounding which might be affected, followed by correct and regular monitoring, or alternatively replace the component.     

Using Essential Patent Index and Essential Technological Strength to evaluate industrial technological innovation competitiveness

The aim of this article is to develop new patent indicators for evaluating technological innovation competitiveness between companies. A novel indicator representing an industrial’s patent performance, Essential Patent Index (EPI), was developed by incorporating information on who cited these patents and when these patents were cited, based on the assumption that both contribute to meaningful quality assessment. By combining EPI and Chi’s well known Technological Strength (TS) indicator, a second novel indicator Essential Technological Strength (ETS) was developed to represent the innovation competitiveness of an individual company. In this study, patent performance of three high-tech industries in Taiwan were analyzed using ETS as well as the traditional TS for comparison. Results from this analysis demonstrated that ETS provided better insights by clearly verifying the latent influence of citations, reinforcing the impact of essential patents, and aggrandizing the differences of innovation competitiveness between companies.     

产业共性技术分类模型方法研究

在深入研究产业共性技术的定义及特征的基础上,从共享性、重要性、公益性三个维度对产业共性技术进行了分类研究,运用三维结构模型和矩阵模型对产业共性技术进行了直观描述,给出了对产业共性技术进行分类的综合评分方法,对产业共性技术进行了区间划分,为政府支持产业共性技术创新政策的制定提供了参考依据.     

Socio-economic impact assessment of industrial projects in India

Socio-economic impact assessment (SEIA) is conducted in advance to determine the socioeconomic consequences of industrial projects. The focus is on the project-affected people. All possible data is collected from census information and academic institutions. Personal interviews are also conducted with the local people and their administrative heads. The main phases of the project addressed are pre- construction, construction and operation. Issues addressed include compensation payment for the land, provision of employment, and alternative accommodation for the people affected. A decision on the acceptability of the project is taken after assessing the positive and negative socio-economic impacts.     

Analysis of the voltage harmonic distortion at buses feeding office loads

The harmonic distortion of the phase-to-neutral voltage at low-voltage buses feeding office load is investigated for various cable configurations, lengths and cross-sections. The investigation is carried out with a software model that was validated with analytical expressions and measurements taken at a real installation. It is shown that the selection of a cable should be based not only on its ampacity and allowable voltage drop but also on its configuration, in order to avoid excessive voltage harmonic distortion. Configurations where the neutral conductor is part of a four-core cable lead to relatively small harmonic distortion, whereas cable configurations where the neutral conductor runs separately cause high-voltage harmonic distortion. In the latter case, the neutral conductor develops a significant voltage with respect to the ground. Increasing the cross-section of the neutral conductor, as the existing standards dictate, may prevent its overloading from zero-sequence harmonic currents but hardly improves the voltage harmonic distortion at the load bus.     

Framework for the environmental damage assessment of an industrial process chain

On the basis of the life cycle approach, a framework for the assessment of the environmental damages generated by an industrial process chain is established. In order to consider all the processes of the life cycle, a methodology is developed based on an eco-matrix formed by chemical process eco-vectors containing all their environmental loads. To perform the impact assessment, environmental damage indicators are estimated in the most accurate way possible for each process. For this, site-specific evaluation is carried out applying damage functions and, hence, for each damage indicator, a damage matrix is obtained. In order to make the methodology more practical, options like dominance analysis are presented. Because of the large number of environmental loads, the focus is on the priority pollutants and then the final estimations are done with one indicator per safeguard subject. The damage indicators selected in this paper are damage costs, ecological damage parameter (both site-specific) and global damage estimates. As for the verification of the methodology, a study has been carried out based on the life cycle of the electricity produced by a municipal waste incinerator.     

Evaluating industrial grade functionalized multiwalled carbon nanotubes by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy

Utilization of carbon nanotubes in various applications is a function of their dispersion in respective matrix which effectively depends on the functionalization employed. Functional group distribution on Carbon Nanotube surface is usually a complex mixture of groups depending on the oxidizing agent employed. In this regard, nine varieties of Industrial grade multiwalled carbon nanotubes belonging to 10–30, 20–40 and 50–80?nm outer diameter ranges but differing in functionality (carboxyl and hydroxyl) were analyzed. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy was employed to quantify the different functionalities on pristine, hydroxyl and carboxyl functionalized multiwalled carbon nanotubes and high-resolution transmission electron microscopy was used to image the internal structure including the side wall damage in functionalized varieties. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy measurements on nine batches have suggested the presence of carbonyl, carboxyl and hydroxyl functional groups on all multiwalled carbon nanotubes in different proportions. This implies that it is not possible to have exclusive hydroxyl or carboxyl functionalization on a CNT surface Additionally, comparison is drawn between already existing deconvolution procedures from literature.     

Dose-mortality assessment upon reuse and recycling of industrial sludge

This study provides a novel attempt to put forward, in general toxicological terms, quantitative ranking of toxicity of various sources of sludge for possible reusability in further applications. The high leaching concentrations of copper in printed circuit board (PCB) sludge and chromium in leather sludge apparently exceeded current Taiwan's EPA regulatory thresholds and should be classified as hazardous wastes. Dose-mortality analysis indicated that the toxicity ranking of different sources of sludge was PCB sludge>CaF(2) sludge>leather sludge. PCB sludge was also confirmed as a hazardous waste since the toxicity potency of PCB sludge was nearly identical to CdCl(2). However, leather sludge seemed to be much less toxic than as anticipated, perhaps due to a significant decrease of toxic species bioavailable in the aqueous phase to the reporter bacterium Escherichia coli DH5alpha. For possible reusability of sludge, maximum concentrations allowable to be considered "safe" (ca. EC(100)/100) were 9.68, 42.1 and 176 mgL(-1) for CaF(2) sludge, PCB sludge and leather sludge, respectively.