A process for selective graphic representation and/or evaluation of the Doppler spectrum of objects limitedly resistant to sonic intensity, for example biological organs and tissues, by an ultrasonic process wherein a material is introduced in the examination area to be acoustically irradiated, nonlinear oscillations are produced in the examination area by irradiated ultrasonic waves and the signal is evaluated by an ultrasonic converter. Also, a circuit for carrying out the above process is disclosed.

Ultrasonic processes and circuits for performing them

A system and method for cleaning oil spills from the surface of a body of water involves deploying a plurality of remotely guided self-propelled floating liquid hydrocarbons collection and separation apparatus, floating liquid hydrocarbons retention booms and floating liquid hydrocarbons storage devices, moving the liquid hydrocarbons boom to contain the liquid hydrocarbons, moving the liquid hydrocarbons collection and separation apparatus by remote guidance into the contained liquid hydrocarbons and operating the apparatus to separate the liquid hydrocarbons from the water, and pumping the separated liquid hydrocarbons into the floating liquid hydrocarbons storage devices.

Oil recovery system and apparatus

A skimmer for removal of a layer of oil or other floating pollutants from the surface of a body of water incorporating a sump box having a pump disposed therein for conveying material from the sump box into a floating barge, vessel or other area. A free floating weir forming means is disposed forwardly of the sump box and connected and communicated therewith in such a manner that the weir forming means may vary in elevational relation to the sump box without the sump box being elevationally varied in relation to the surface of the water. The weir forming means is supported by float means which orients the weir of the weir forming means in desired relationship to the surface of the water.

Oil skimmer module with free floating weir trough

Skimmer for removing oil from the surface of a body of water which is articulated from front to rear to be wave comformable and/or has a quiescent collection zone formed by bottom and/or forward baffles. Flexible skimming head for use with or independently of the above skimmer composed of a foraminous sheet having an integral chevron flow pattern on its upper surface; floating skimming head for use similar to the preceding head with a central, axially vertically movable cone or other configuration forming a suction mouth. Boom for use with or independently of the above skimmer which is composed of converging double booms. Storage capacity for oil collected by the above skimmer or otherwise composed of onboard and/or offboard membranes.

Oil spill cleanup system

A floating pond skimmer is coupled by a fluid conduit to a remote filter/aerating apparatus. The skimmer sucks a mixture of solids and water, grinds/chops the solids, and pumps the reduced solids and water through the conduit to the filter/aerating apparatus which separates the solids from the mixture and aerates the water from the mixture. The floating skimmer preferably includes a vortex chamber, an on-board pump with a grinding impeller, an adjustable ballast, and an anchor. The filter/aerating apparatus includes an inclined screen and a drain tray beneath the inclined screen coupled to a water discharge conduit. Optionally, an aeration pump is coupled to the discharge conduit. Also optionally, a removable solid waste hopper is located at the lower end of the inclined screen. Otherwise the solid waste simply falls into a compost pile at the bottom of the inclined screen.

Methods and systems for removing floating solid waste from the surface of a watercourse

An apparatus for separating a selected liquid from a second liquid in which the selected liquid is immiscible by a surface tension action utilizing a hollow liquid surface tension separator having a surface tension screen wall is described. The separator is filled with the selected liquid and the outer side of its surface tension screen is placed in contact with the body of immiscible liquids to be separated, such that each screen pore exposed to the second liquid of the body contains a liquid-liquid interface whose interfacial surface tension resists passage of the second liquid through the pore. A pressure differential, less than the critical pressure differential necessary to overcome the interfacial surface tension force acting across the pore, is established across the screen to drive the selected liquid only through the screen into the separator. The primary application of the invention involves the removal or recovery of oil from a water surface utilizing an oil recovery apparatus which floats on and in some cases is propelled along the water surface and is equipped with one or more surface tension liquid separators for extracting the oil from the water surface.

Surface tension method of and apparatus for separating immiscible liquids

An acousto-optical method and apparatus for monitoring individual constituents of differing acoustical transparency in a multi-constituent flow through a conduit. The conduit is acoustically coupled to an external acoustic source of fixed frequency and an external acoustic wave transmission medium in a manner such that acoustic wave energy from the source is transmitted laterally through a section of the conduit into the acoustic medium to produce within the medium distorted acoustic waves containing information representing each constituent present within the conduit section. This acoustic information is transformed to equivalent light information by a light-sound wave interaction yielding a light sideband which may be optically processed to image the constituents or converted to an electrical output representing the constituents.

Acousto-optical multi-constituent flow monitoring method and apparatus

An object situated in an acoustic medium, such as water or soil, characterized by relatively high acoustic absorption is optically imaged by a novel acousto-optical imaging technique. Relatively low frequency acoustic waves which are subject to relatively low attenuation by the ambient medium are transmitted through the medium to the object and emanate from the object as distorted acoustic waves containing information defining an image of the object. These distorted acoustic waves are received by an acousto-optical coupling medium which is excited by relatively high frequency and large amplitude acoustic waves. The distorted low frequency acoustic waves and high frequency waves undergo non-linear interaction to produce in the coupling medium resultant acoustic wave sets having frequencies equal to the sum and difference, respectively, of the low and high frequencies and each containing essentially the same image information as the distorted waves. A monochromatic light beam is projected through the coupling medium to impinge the wave fronts of one resultant wave set, preferably the sim wave set, at an oblique angle which causes Bragg diffraction of the light waves by the acoustic waves, such that the light waves emerging from the coupling medium form an optical image of the object.

R Johnson

Papers

Surface tension method of and apparatus for separating immiscible liquids

Acousto-optical multi-constituent flow monitoring method and apparatus

Low frequency parametric acousto-optical imaging method and apparatus