Ceramic
A ceramic is a solid material comprising an inorganic compound of metal, non-metal or metalloid atoms held in ionic and covalent bonds. Common examples are earthenware and brick; the crystallinity of ceramic materials ranges from oriented to semi-crystalline and completely amorphous. Most fired ceramics are either vitrified or semi-vitrified as is the case with earthenware and porcelain. Varying crystallinity and electron composition in the ionic and covalent bonds cause most ceramic materials to be good thermal and electrical insulators. With such a large range of possible options for the composition/structure of a ceramic, the breadth of the subject is vast, identifiable attributes are difficult to specify for the group as a whole. General properties such as high melting temperature, high hardness, poor conductivity, high moduli of elasticity, chemical resistance and low ductility are the norm, with known exceptions to each of these rules. Many composites, such as fiberglass and carbon fiber, while containing ceramic materials, are not considered to be part of the ceramic family.
The earliest ceramics made by humans were pottery objects or figurines made from clay, either by itself or mixed with other materials like silica and sintered in fire. Ceramics were glazed and fired to create smooth, colored surfaces, decreasing porosity through the use of glassy, amorphous ceramic coatings on top of the crystalline ceramic substrates. Ceramics now include domestic and building products, as well as a wide range of ceramic art. In the 20th century, new ceramic materials were developed for use in advanced ceramic engineering, such as in semiconductors; the word "ceramic" comes from the Greek word κεραμικός, "of pottery" or "for pottery", from κέραμος, "potter's clay, pottery". The earliest known mention of the root "ceram-" is the Mycenaean Greek ke-ra-me-we, "workers of ceramics", written in Linear B syllabic script; the word "ceramic" may be used as an adjective to describe a material, product or process, or it may be used as a noun, either singular, or, more as the plural noun "ceramics".
A ceramic material is an inorganic, non-metallic crystalline oxide, nitride or carbide material. Some elements, such as carbon or silicon, may be considered ceramics. Ceramic materials are brittle, strong in compression, weak in shearing and tension, they withstand chemical erosion that occurs in other materials subjected to acidic or caustic environments. Ceramics can withstand high temperatures, ranging from 1,000 °C to 1,600 °C. Glass is not considered a ceramic because of its amorphous character. However, glassmaking involves several steps of the ceramic process, its mechanical properties are similar to ceramic materials. Traditional ceramic raw materials include clay minerals such as kaolinite, whereas more recent materials include aluminium oxide, more known as alumina; the modern ceramic materials, which are classified as advanced ceramics, include silicon carbide and tungsten carbide. Both are valued for their abrasion resistance and hence find use in applications such as the wear plates of crushing equipment in mining operations.
Advanced ceramics are used in the medicine, electronics industries and body armor. Crystalline ceramic materials are not amenable to a great range of processing. Methods for dealing with them tend to fall into one of two categories – either make the ceramic in the desired shape, by reaction in situ, or by "forming" powders into the desired shape, sintering to form a solid body. Ceramic forming techniques include shaping by hand, slip casting, tape casting, injection molding, dry pressing, other variations. Noncrystalline ceramics, being glass, tend to be formed from melts; the glass is shaped when either molten, by casting, or when in a state of toffee-like viscosity, by methods such as blowing into a mold. If heat treatments cause this glass to become crystalline, the resulting material is known as a glass-ceramic used as cook-tops and as a glass composite material for nuclear waste disposal; the physical properties of any ceramic substance are a direct result of its crystalline structure and chemical composition.
Solid-state chemistry reveals the fundamental connection between microstructure and properties such as localized density variations, grain size distribution, type of porosity and second-phase content, which can all be correlated with ceramic properties such as mechanical strength σ by the Hall-Petch equation, toughness, dielectric constant, the optical properties exhibited by transparent materials. Ceramography is the art and science of preparation and evaluation of ceramic microstructures. Evaluation and characterization of ceramic microstructures is implemented on similar spatial scales to that used in the emerging field of nanotechnology: from tens of angstroms to tens of micrometers; this is somewhere between the minimum wavelength of visible light and the resolution limit of the naked eye. The microstructure includes most grains, secondary phases, grain boundaries, micro-
Pentax cameras
This article discusses the cameras – 35 mm SLRs – manufactured by Pentax Ricoh Imaging Corp. and its predecessors, Pentax Corporation and Asahi Optical Co. Ltd.. It covers from the first "Asahiflex" models in 1952 and their successor, the pivotal "Asahi Pentax" single-lens reflex camera, to the present time; the period around 1950 marked the return of the Japanese photographic industry to the vigorous level of the early 1940s, its emergence as a major exporter. The newly reborn industry had sold many of its cameras to the occupation forces and they were well received; the Korean War saw a huge influx of journalists and photographers to the Far East, where they were impressed by lenses from companies such as Nikon and Canon for their Leica rangefinder cameras, by bodies by these and other companies to supplement and replace the Leica and Contax cameras they were using. This was the background to the development of Asahi Optical's first camera. 1952: The first Japanese SLR 1954: The world's first instant return mirror system 1957: The first time a pentaprism has been utilized in the viewfinder of a single lens reflex camera 1964: The world's first through-the-lens metering system 1966: Asahi is the world's first camera manufacturer to produce one million SLRs 1967: Opening of the first camera museum in Japan owned by a camera manufacturer located at Nishiazabu, Tokyo 1971: The world's first SLR camera with a TTL automatic-exposure control.
This camera was the Pentax ES 1971: The world's first Super Multi-Coated lenses 1976: The world's first light meter is invented by Pentax and used by many brands afterwards. 1976: The smallest and lightest SLR camera 1979: The world's first camera to incorporate the concept of push-button shutter speed control. This camera was the Pentax ME Super 1980: The world's first through-the-lens autofocus camera; this camera was the Pentax ME F 1981: The first camera manufacturer to reach the production milestone of 10 million SLR cameras 1984: The world's first multi-mode medium format camera. This camera was the Pentax 645 1987: The first 35mm SLR camera to feature a built-in TTL auto flash 1991: The world's first weather-resistant zoom compact camera is launched; that camera was the "PENTAX ZOOM 90WR" 1995: The world's smallest autofocus SLR camera designed based on the concept of "intuitive operation" is launched. That camera was the PENTAX MZ-5 1997: The world's first autofocus medium format SLR camera.
That camera was the Pentax 645N 2008: The world's smallest digital SLR camera equipped with an image sensor equivalent to the APS-C size format is launched. That camera was the PENTAX K-m 2010: The world's first to introduce a digital medium format SLR camera; that camera was the Pentax 645D 2011: The world’s smallest and lightest interchangeable lens camera in a body smaller than every other digital ILC body available on the market. That camera was the Pentax Q 2012: The world's first medium format DSLR without IR cut filter for research and law enforcement use; this camera was the 645D IR 2012: The first mirrorless camera. This camera was the K-01 2014: The world's first to achieve a score above 100 at DxO; the camera was the 645Z with a 101 DxO score 2016: Pentax was the first to introduce a weather resistant and backside illuminated flexible tilt type LCD monitor with their first professional full frame DSLR. This camera was the Pentax K-1 Asahi Optical introduced its first 35 mm camera in 1952.
Asahi was unusual in deciding to start with a high-quality 35mm camera, not a copy of something else. Its designers were convinced of the inherent superiority of the SLR and so proceeded along these lines; this effort resulted in the Asahiflex I, the first Japanese 35mm SLR. There has always been a close design relationship between the products of Asahi, those made in Germany by a variety of manufacturers, most notably Zeiss Ikon. In the case of the Asahiflex, study should be made of the immediate pre-war and immediate post-war models of the Praktiflex, which could be properly called the inspiration for the Asahiflex; the Asahiflex I had a non-interchangeable waist-level viewfinder, with a direct optical viewfinder for eye-level use. The Asahiflex I had a non-returning mirror and shutter speeds from 1/25 to 1/500; the camera used. It went through some minor modifications for flash use, resulting in the IA. With the IIB a key advance was made: the quick-return mirror; the problem of mirror black-out was one of the main problems with prior SLR designs reducing usability and a major reason for the greater popularity of the rangefinder.
With the IIB there emerged the first practical quick-return mirror, a vital innovation and one, adopted by other manufacturers. With the final model in the series, the IIA, the Asahiflex gained slow speeds from 1/25th of a second to 1/2 of a second. Asahiflex I Asahiflex IA Asahiflex IIB Asahiflex IIA A recognized problem with the Asahiflex series was that, lacking a pentaprism, it was difficult to use the camera in a vertical position and taking pictures of moving objects was impossible; the small viewfinder on top of the camera was of little use when the photographer wanted to use a 135 mm or 500 mm lens. The problem was recognized by Asahi. In 1957, Asahi introduced the Pe
Nikon
Nikon Corporation known just as Nikon, is a Japanese multinational corporation headquartered in Tokyo, specializing in optics and imaging products. Nikon's products include cameras, camera lenses, microscopes, ophthalmic lenses, measurement instruments, rifle scopes, spotting scopes, the steppers used in the photolithography steps of semiconductor fabrication, of which it is the world's second largest manufacturer; the company is the eighth-largest chip equipment maker as reported in 2017. The companies held by Nikon form the Nikon Group. Among its products are Nikkor imaging lenses, the Nikon F-series of 35 mm film SLR cameras, the Nikon D-series of digital SLR cameras, the Coolpix series of compact digital cameras, the Nikonos series of underwater film cameras. Nikon's main competitors in camera and lens manufacturing include Canon, Fujifilm, Panasonic and Olympus. Founded on July 25, 1917 as Nippon Kōgaku Kōgyō Kabushikigaisha, the company was renamed to Nikon Corporation, after its cameras, in 1988.
Nikon is a member of the Mitsubishi group of companies. Nikon Corporation was established on 25 July 1917 when three leading optical manufacturers merged to form a comprehensive integrated optical company known as Nippon Kōgaku Tōkyō K. K. Over the next sixty years, this growing company became a manufacturer of optical lenses and equipment used in cameras, binoculars and inspection equipment. During World War II the company operated thirty factories with 2,000 employees, manufacturing binoculars, bomb sights, periscopes for the Japanese military. After the war Nippon Kōgaku reverted to producing its civilian product range in a single factory. In 1948, the first Nikon-branded camera was released, the Nikon I. Nikon lenses were popularised by the American photojournalist David Douglas Duncan. Duncan was working in Tokyo. Duncan had met Jun Miki, who introduced Duncan to Nikon lenses. From July 1950 to January 1951, Duncan covered the Korean War. Fitting Nikon optics to his Leica rangefinder cameras produced high contrast negatives with sharp resolution at the centre field.
Founded in 1917 as Nippon Kōgaku Kōgyō Kabushikigaisha, the company was renamed Nikon Corporation, after its cameras, in 1988. The name Nikon, which dates from 1946, sounds like a merging of Nippon Kōgaku and Zeiss's brand Ikon; this would cause some early problems in Germany as Zeiss complained that Nikon violated its trademarked camera. From 1963 to 1968 the Nikon F in particular was therefore labeled'Nikkor'; the Nikkor brand was introduced in 1932, a westernised rendering of an earlier version Nikkō, an abbreviation of the company's original full name. Nikkor is the Nikon brand name for its lenses. Another early brand used on microscopes was Joico, an abbreviation of "Japan Optical Industries Co". Expeed is the brand Nikon uses for its image processors since 2007; the Nikon SP and other 1950s and 1960s rangefinder cameras competed directly with models from Leica and Zeiss. However, the company ceased developing its rangefinder line to focus its efforts on the Nikon F single-lens reflex line of cameras, successful upon its introduction in 1959.
For nearly 30 years, Nikon's F-series SLRs were the most used small-format cameras among professional photographers, as well as by the U. S. space program. Nikon popularized many features in professional SLR photography, such as the modular camera system with interchangeable lenses, motor drives, data backs. However, as auto focus SLRs became available from Minolta and others in the mid-1980s, Nikon's line of manual-focus cameras began to seem out of date. Despite introducing one of the first autofocus models, the slow and bulky F3AF, the company's determination to maintain lens compatibility with its F-mount prevented rapid advances in autofocus technology. Canon introduced a new type of lens-camera interface with its electronic Canon EOS cameras and Canon EF lens mount in 1987; the much faster lens performance permitted by Canon's electronic focusing and aperture control prompted many professional photographers to switch to the Canon system through the 1990s. Nikon created some of the first digital SLRs for NASA, used in the Space Shuttle since 1991.
After a 1990s partnership with Kodak to produce digital SLR cameras based on existing Nikon film bodies, Nikon released the Nikon D1 SLR under its own name in 1999. Although it used an APS-C-size light sensor only 2/3 the size of a 35 mm film frame, the D1 was among the first digital cameras to have sufficient image quality and a low enough price for some professionals to use it as a replacement for a film SLR; the company has a Coolpix line which grew as consumer digital photography became prevalent through the early 2000s. Through the mid-2000s, Nikon's line of professional and enthusiast DSLRs and lenses including their back compatible AF-S lens line remained in second place behind Canon in SLR camera sales, Canon
Minolta
Minolta Co. Ltd. was a Japanese manufacturer of cameras, camera accessories, fax machines, laser printers. Minolta was founded in Japan, in 1928 as Nichi-Doku Shashinki Shōten, it is best known for making the first integrated autofocus 35mm SLR camera system. In 1931, the company adopted its current name, an acronym for "Mechanism, Instruments and Lenses by Tashima". In 1933, the brand name first appeared on a camera, a copy of the Plaubel Makina called "Minolta". In 2003, Minolta merged with Konica to form Konica Minolta. On 19 January 2006, Konica Minolta announced that it was leaving the camera and photo business, that it would sell a portion of its SLR camera business to Sony as part of its move to pull out of the business of selling cameras and photographic film. 1928: Kazuo Tashima establishes Nichi-Doku Shashinki Shōten. 1929: Marketed the company's first camera, the "Nifcarette". 1937: The Minolta Flex is Japan's second twin-lens reflex camera. 1947: Introduction of the long lived 35mm rangefinder camera Minolta-35 1958: The Minolta SR-2 is Minolta's first single-lens reflex camera.
1959: The Minolta SR-1. 1962: John Glenn takes a specially modified Ansco-logoed Minolta Hi-Matic camera into space aboard Friendship 7. The company changes its name to Minolta Camera Co. Ltd. 1966: The Minolta SR-T 101 SLR camera is one of the first with TTL full aperture light metering. The first is Topcon RE Super from 1963. 1972: Minolta signs an agreement to cooperate with Leica in SLR development. 1976: The Leica R3 is introduced. Minolta produces the R3, R4, R5 models in the Leica R series. Subsequent cameras are built in Germany by Leica themselves. 1977: The Minolta XD-11 is introduced, the world's first'multi mode' SLR offering M, A, S modes, with a'Program override' in S mode effected by a computer chip, the world's first Program mode. 1981: Implementation of Minolta's invention and patent of TTL OTF exposure metering: the Minolta CLE is the first 35mm rangefinder camera to feature TTL metering and aperture priority autoexposure. The Minolta X-700 manual-focus SLR is introduced; the Minolta XD-11 is the first Minolta product branded with an updated logo, in use until the 2003 merger with Konica.
1985: The Minolta Maxxum 7000 Alpha Mount Camera becomes the world's first autofocus 35mm SLR with in-camera autofocus motor. 1987: Honeywell files lawsuit against Minolta for patent infringement over autofocus technologies. 1991: Minolta's autofocus design was found to infringe on the patents of Honeywell, a U. S. corporation. After protracted litigation, in 1991 Minolta was ordered to pay Honeywell damages, trial costs, other expenses in a final amount of $127.6 million 1992: Minolta settles out of court with Honeywell. 1994: The company changes its name to Minolta Co. Ltd. because it no longer is a camera company. 1995: Introduction of the Minolta RD-175, a 1.75-megapixel digital SLR camera. 1996: The Minolta Vectis camera is a new SLR system designed around the Advanced Photo System film format. 1998: The Minolta Maxxum 9 autofocus SLR is introduced. This system is targeted toward the professional photographer and has many features not duplicated by the competition. 2003: DiMAGE A1 introduced world's first sensor-based anti-shake, was the final Minolta product branded prior to the Konica Minolta merger.
2004: Minolta and Konica merge to become Konica Minolta Holdings, Inc. 2005: The company announces joint venture with Sony on CCD and CMOS technologies. 2006: Konica Minolta announces it is discontinuing all film and digital camera production, ending a 78-year history as a camera manufacturer. Final models released were Dimage X1 and Z6. Konica Minolta Photo Image, Inc.'s assets regarding digital camera technology are transferred to Sony for continued development started from the joint venture. Relying on imported German technology, Nichi-Doku turned out their first product, a bellows camera called the Nifcarette, in March 1929. By 1937, the company reorganized as Chiyoda Kogaku Seikō, K. K. and built the first Japanese-made twin-lens reflex camera, the Minoltaflex, based on the German Rolleiflex. In 1947, the Minolta-35 was introduced, it is based on the Leica rangefinder camera concept with the 39mm screw lens-mount. It uses the standard 35mm film in cassettes; the standard lens is the Super Rokkor 1:2.8 50mm.
In 1950, Minolta developed a planetarium projector, the first-ever made in Japan, beginning the company's connection to astronomical optics. John Glenn took a Minolta Hi-Matic rangefinder 35 mm camera aboard the spacecraft Friendship 7 in 1962, in 1968, Apollo 8 orbited the moon with a Minolta Space Meter aboard. In the late 1950s and 1960s, Minolta competed in the medium-format roll film camera market with the excellent Autocord series of TLR cameras. Marketed at a time when other indifferent copies of the Rolleiflex TLR design were flooding the market, the Autocords soon acquired an enviable reputation for the high quality of their Rokkor optics. In 1958, Minolta introduced its SR-2 single lens reflex 35mm camera, equipped with a bayonet mount and instant return mirror. In 1966 Minolta introduced the SR-T line. Although well-made and regarded as some of the most inn
Single-lens reflex camera
A single-lens reflex camera is a camera that uses a mirror and prism system that permits the photographer to view through the lens and see what will be captured. With twin lens reflex and rangefinder cameras, the viewed image could be different from the final image; when the shutter button is pressed on most SLRs, the mirror flips out of the light path, allowing light to pass through to the light receptor and the image to be captured. Prior to the development of SLR, all cameras with viewfinders had two optical light paths: one path through the lens to the film, another path positioned above or to the side; because the viewfinder and the film lens cannot share the same optical path, the viewing lens is aimed to intersect with the film lens at a fixed point somewhere in front of the camera. This is not problematic for pictures taken at a middle or longer distance, but parallax causes framing errors in close-up shots. Moreover, focusing the lens of a fast reflex camera when it is opened to wider apertures is not easy.
Most SLR cameras permit upright and laterally correct viewing through use of a roof pentaprism situated in the optical path between the reflex mirror and viewfinder. Light, which comes both horizontally and vertically inverted after passing through the lens, is reflected upwards by the reflex mirror, into the pentaprism where it is reflected several times to correct the inversions caused by the lens, align the image with the viewfinder; when the shutter is released, the mirror moves out of the light path, the light shines directly onto the film. The Canon Pellix, along with several special purpose high speed cameras, were an exception to the moving mirror system, wherein the mirror was a fixed beamsplitting pellicle. Focus can be adjusted manually automatically by an autofocus system; the viewfinder can include a matte focusing screen located just above the mirror system to diffuse the light. This permits accurate viewing and focusing useful with interchangeable lenses. Up until the 1990s, SLR was the most advanced photographic preview system available, but the recent development and refinement of digital imaging technology with an on-camera live LCD preview screen has overshadowed SLR's popularity.
Nearly all inexpensive compact digital cameras now include an LCD preview screen allowing the photographer to see what the CCD is capturing. However, SLR is still popular in high-end and professional cameras because they are system cameras with interchangeable parts, allowing customization, they have far less shutter lag, allowing photographs to be timed more precisely. The pixel resolution, contrast ratio, refresh rate, color gamut of an LCD preview screen cannot compete with the clarity and shadow detail of a direct-viewed optical SLR viewfinder. Large format SLR cameras were first marketed with the introduction of C. R. Smith's Monocular Duplex. SLRs for smaller exposure formats were launched in the 1920s by several camera makers; the first 35mm SLR available to the mass market, Leica's PLOOT reflex housing along with a 200mm f4.5 lens paired to a 35mm rangefinder camera body, debuted in 1935. The Soviet Спорт a 24mm by 36mm image size, was prototyped in 1934 and went to market in 1937. K. Nüchterlein's Kine Exakta was the first integrated 35mm SLR to enter the market.
Additional Exakta models, all with waist-level finders, were produced up to and during World War II. Another ancestor of the modern SLR camera was the Swiss-made Alpa, innovative, influenced the Japanese cameras; the first eye-level SLR viewfinder was patented in Hungary on August 23, 1943 by Jenő Dulovits, who designed the first 35 mm camera with one, the Duflex, which used a system of mirrors to provide a laterally correct, upright image in the eye-level viewfinder. The Duflex, which went into serial production in 1948, was the world's first SLR with an instant-return mirror; the first commercially produced SLR that employed a roof pentaprism was the Italian Rectaflex A.1000, shown in full working condition on Milan fair April 1948 and produced from September the same year, thus being on the market one year before the east German Zeiss Ikon VEB Contax S, announced on May 20, 1949, produced from September. The Japanese adopted and further developed the SLR. In 1952, Asahi developed the Asahiflex and in 1954, the Asahiflex IIB.
In 1957, the Asahi Pentax combined the right-hand thumb wind lever. Nikon and Yashica introduced their first SLRs in 1959; as a small matter of history, the first 35 mm camera to feature through the lens light metering may have been Nikon, with a prototype rangefinder camera, the SPX. According to the website below, the camera used Nikon'S' type rangefinder lenses. Through-the-lens light metering is known as "behind-the-lens metering". In the SLR design scheme, there were various placements made for the metering cells, all of which used CdS photocells; the cells were either located in the pentaprism housing, where they metered light transmitted through the focusing screen. Pentax was the first manufacturer to show an early prototype 35 mm behind-the-lens metering SLR camera, named the Pentax Spotmatic; the camera was shown at the 1960 photokina show. However, the first
Honeywell
Honeywell International Inc. is an American multinational conglomerate company that makes a variety of commercial and consumer products, engineering services and aerospace systems for a wide variety of customers, from private consumers to major corporations and governments. The company operates four business units, known as Strategic Business Units – Honeywell Aerospace and Building Technologies and Productivity Solutions, Honeywell Performance Materials and Technologies. Honeywell is a Fortune 100 company. In 2018, Honeywell ranked 77th in the Fortune 500. Honeywell has a global workforce of 130,000, of whom 58,000 are employed in the United States; the company is headquartered in New Jersey. Its current chief executive officer is Darius Adamczyk; the company and its corporate predecessors were part of the Dow Jones Industrial Average Index from December 7, 1925 until February 9, 2008. The company's current name, Honeywell International Inc. is the product of a merger in which Honeywell Inc. was acquired by the much larger AlliedSignal in 1999.
The company headquarters were consolidated with AlliedSignal's headquarters in Morristown, New Jersey. In 2015, the headquarters were moved to Morris Plains. On November 30, 2018, Honeywell announced that its corporate headquarters would be moved to Charlotte. Honeywell has many brands that commercial and retail consumers may recognize, including its line of home thermostats and Garrett turbochargers. In addition to consumer home products, Honeywell itself produces thermostats, security alarm systems, air cleaners and dehumidifiers; the company licenses its brand name for use in various retail products made by partner manufacturers, including air conditioners, fans, security safes, home generators, paper shredders. Although Mark Honeywell’s Heating Specialty Company was not established until 1906, today’s Honeywell traces its roots back to 1885 when the Swiss-born Albert Butz invented the damper-flapper, a thermostat for coal furnaces, to automatically regulate heating systems; the following year he founded the Butz Thermo-Electric Regulator Company.
In 1888, after a falling out with his investors, Butz left the company and transferred the patents to the legal firm Paul and Merwin, who renamed the company the Consolidated Temperature Controlling Company. As the years passed, CTCC struggled with growing debts, they underwent several name changes in an attempt to keep the business afloat. After the company was renamed to the Electric Heat Regulator Company in 1893, W. R. Sweatt, a stockholder in the company, was sold "an extensive list of patents" and named secretary-treasurer.:22 On February 23, 1898 he bought out the remaining shares of the company from the other stockholders. In 1906, Mark Honeywell founded the Honeywell Heating Specialty Company in Wabash, Indiana, to manufacture and market his invention, the mercury seal generator; as Honeywell’s company grew it began to clash with the renamed Minneapolis Heat Regulator Company. This led to the merging of both companies into the publicly held Minneapolis-Honeywell Regulator Company in 1927.
Honeywell was named the company's first president, alongside W. R. Sweatt as its first chairman. W. R. Sweatt and his son Harold provided 75 years of uninterrupted leadership for the company. W. R. Sweatt survived rough spots and turned an innovative idea – thermostatic heating control – into a thriving business. Harold, who took over in 1934, led Honeywell through a period of growth and global expansion that set the stage for Honeywell to become a global technology leader; the merger into the Minneapolis-Honeywell Regulator Company proved to be a saving grace for the corporation. The combined assets were valued at over $3.5 million, with less than $1 million in liabilities just months before Black Monday.:49 In 1931, Minneapolis-Honeywell began a period of expansion and acquisition when they purchased Time-O-Stat Controls Company, giving the company access to a greater number of patents to be used in their controls systems. 1934 marked Minneapolis-Honeywell’s first foray into the international market, when they acquired the Brown Instrument Company, inherited their relationship with the Yamatake Company of Tokyo, a Japan-based distributor.:51 Later that same year, Minneapolis-Honeywell would start distributorships across Canada, as well as one in the Netherlands, their first European office.
This expansion into international markets continued in 1936, with their first distributorship in London, as well as their first foreign assembly facility being established in Canada. By 1937, ten years after the merger, Minneapolis-Honeywell had over 3,000 employees, with $16 million in annual revenue. Having survived the Depression, Minneapolis-Honeywell was approached by the US military for engineering and manufacturing projects. In 1941, Minneapolis-Honeywell developed a superior tank periscope and camera stabilizers, as well as the C-1 autopilot; the C-1 revolutionized precision bombing in the war effort, was used on the two B-29 bombers that dropped atomic bombs on Japan in 1945. The success of these projects led Minneapolis-Honeywell to open an Aero division in Chicago on October 5, 1942.:73 This division was responsible for the development of the formation stick to control autopilots, more accurate gas gauges for planes, the turbo supercharger.:79 In 1950, Minneapolis-Honeywell’s Aero division was contracted for the controls on the first US nuclear submarine, USS Nautilus.:88 The following year, the company acquired Intervox Company for
Japan
Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies off the eastern coast of the Asian continent and stretches from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and the Philippine Sea in the south; the kanji that make up Japan's name mean "sun origin", it is called the "Land of the Rising Sun". Japan is a stratovolcanic archipelago consisting of about 6,852 islands; the four largest are Honshu, Hokkaido and Shikoku, which make up about ninety-seven percent of Japan's land area and are referred to as home islands. The country is divided into 47 prefectures in eight regions, with Hokkaido being the northernmost prefecture and Okinawa being the southernmost one; the population of 127 million is the world's tenth largest. 90.7 % of people live in cities. About 13.8 million people live in the capital of Japan. The Greater Tokyo Area is the most populous metropolitan area in the world with over 38 million people. Archaeological research indicates; the first written mention of Japan is in Chinese history texts from the 1st century AD.
Influence from other regions China, followed by periods of isolation from Western Europe, has characterized Japan's history. From the 12th century until 1868, Japan was ruled by successive feudal military shōguns who ruled in the name of the Emperor. Japan entered into a long period of isolation in the early 17th century, ended in 1853 when a United States fleet pressured Japan to open to the West. After nearly two decades of internal conflict and insurrection, the Imperial Court regained its political power in 1868 through the help of several clans from Chōshū and Satsuma – and the Empire of Japan was established. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, victories in the First Sino-Japanese War, the Russo-Japanese War and World War I allowed Japan to expand its empire during a period of increasing militarism; the Second Sino-Japanese War of 1937 expanded into part of World War II in 1941, which came to an end in 1945 following the Japanese surrender. Since adopting its revised constitution on May 3, 1947, during the occupation led by SCAP, the sovereign state of Japan has maintained a unitary parliamentary constitutional monarchy with an Emperor and an elected legislature called the National Diet.
Japan is a member of the ASEAN Plus mechanism, UN, the OECD, the G7, the G8, the G20, is considered a great power. Its economy is the world's third-largest by nominal GDP and the fourth-largest by purchasing power parity, it is the world's fourth-largest exporter and fourth-largest importer. Japan benefits from a skilled and educated workforce. Although it has renounced its right to declare war, Japan maintains a modern military with the world's eighth-largest military budget, used for self-defense and peacekeeping roles. Japan is a developed country with a high standard of living and Human Development Index, its population enjoys the highest life expectancy and third lowest infant mortality rate in the world, but is experiencing issues due to an aging population and low birthrate. Japan is renowned for its historical and extensive cinema, influential music industry, video gaming, rich cuisine and its major contributions to science and modern technology; the Japanese word for Japan is 日本, pronounced Nihon or Nippon and means "the origin of the sun".
The character nichi means "sun" or "day". The compound therefore means "origin of the sun" and is the source of the popular Western epithet "Land of the Rising Sun"; the earliest record of the name Nihon appears in the Chinese historical records of the Tang dynasty, the Old Book of Tang. At the end of the seventh century, a delegation from Japan requested that Nihon be used as the name of their country; this name may have its origin in a letter sent in 607 and recorded in the official history of the Sui dynasty. Prince Shōtoku, the Regent of Japan, sent a mission to China with a letter in which he called himself "the Emperor of the Land where the Sun rises"; the message said: "Here, I, the emperor of the country where the sun rises, send a letter to the emperor of the country where the sun sets. How are you". Prior to the adoption of Nihon, other terms such as Yamato and Wakoku were used; the term Wa is a homophone of Wo 倭, used by the Chinese as a designation for the Japanese as early as the third century Three Kingdoms period.
Another form of Wa, Wei in Chinese) was used for an early state in Japan called Nakoku during the Han dynasty. However, the Japanese disliked some connotation of Wa 倭, it was therefore replaced with the substitute character Wa, meaning "togetherness, harmony"; the English word Japan derives from the historical Chinese pronunciation of 日本. The Old Mandarin or early Wu Chinese pronunciation of Japan was recorded by Marco Polo as Cipangu. In modern Shanghainese, a Wu dialect, the pronunciation of characters 日本; the old Malay word for Japan, Japun or Japang, was borrowed from a southern coastal Chinese dialect Fukienese or Ningpo – and this Malay word was encountered by Portuguese traders in Southeast Asia in the 16th century. These Early Portuguese traders brought the word
157.3 billion yen (Business year ending March 31, 2007)
