The U.S. Patent & Trademark Office (USPTO) recently issued twelve U.S. patents to UNM Rainforest Innovations during the months of January, February, & March for technologies invented at the University of New Mexico. The patents, issued during UNM Rainforest Innovations’ 2025 fiscal year third quarter, are for a variety of technologies created by researchers in the Departments of Chemical & Biological Engineering; Electrical & Computer Engineering; Pharmacy; Civil, Construction, & Environmental Engineering; Molecular Genetics & Microbiology; the Center for Quantum Information & Control; the Center for Micro-Engineered Materials; and the Center for High Technology Materials.
Issued Patent for “Silicified Immunogenic Cells, Methods of Making, and Methods of Using”
Patent No. 12,201,651, issued January 21, 2025
Inventors: Rita Serda, Jimin Guo
(Ref. 2019-097)
A pharmaceutical composition includes a silicified cell or fraction thereof, a cationic layer disposed on at least a portion of the surface of the silicified cell or fraction thereof, and an immunomodulatory moiety bound to at least a portion of the cationic layer. Alternatively, the pharmaceutical composition includes a silicified cell or fraction thereof, a cationic layer disposed on at least a portion of the surface of the silicified cell or fraction thereof, an anionic layer disposed on at least a portion of the cationic layer, and an immunomodulatory moiety bound to at least a portion of the anionic layer.
Issued Patent for “Dry Powder Nebulizer”
Patent No. 12,201,766, issued January 21, 2025
This technology is currently licensed.
Inventors: Nicola Jeanne Maynard, Hugh D. C. Smyth
(Ref. 2010-039)
A dry powder delivery device may be configured to provide micronized dry powder particles to airways of a user. The device may include a cylindrical container delimiting a chamber containing at least one magnetically-responsive object, a motor external to said chamber, a magnet external to the chamber and rotatably coupled with the motor, and an outflow member configured to direct airflow to a user. The magnetically-responsive object may be coated with micronized dry powder particles, and the motor may be operable to rotate the magnet about an axis. Rotation of the magnet creates a magnetic field that causes the magnetically-responsive object to move in response to the magnetic field and collide with a side wall of the container to deaggregate the dry powder particles and aerosolize the dry powder in the chamber.
Issued Patent for “Innovative Nanopore Sequencing Technology”
Patent No. 12,203,921, issued January 21, 2025
Inventors: Steven R. J. Brueck, Jeremy Scott Edwards, Alexander Neumann, Yuliya Kuznetsova, Edgar A. Mendoza
(Ref. 2014-045)
Methods and apparatus for long read, label-free, optical nanopore long chain molecule sequencing. In general, the present disclosure describes a novel sequencing technology based on the integration of nanochannels to deliver single long-chain molecules with widely spaced (>wavelength), ˜1-nm aperture “tortuous” nanopores that slow translocation sufficiently to provide massively parallel, single base resolution using optical techniques. A novel, directed self-assembly nanofabrication scheme using simple colloidal nanoparticles is used to form the nanopore arrays atop nanochannels that unfold the long chain molecules. At the surface of the nanoparticle array, strongly localized electromagnetic fields in engineered plasmonic/polaritonic structures allow for single base resolution using optical techniques.
Patent No. 12,204,249, issued January 21, 2025
Inventors: Steven R. J. Brueck, Alexander Neumann, Vineeth Sasidharan
(Ref. 2021-081)
A system for oblique incidence nanopatterning a sample using a grating beam-splitter is disclosed. The system also includes a grating beam-splitter on a tip-tilt adjustable mount. The system also includes a photoresist coated sample mounted on a tip-tilt-z adjustable mount. The system also includes an alignment system to allow adjustment of the tip-tilt adjustable mounts so that a surface of the grating beam-splitter and a surface of the photoresist coated sample are substantially parallel. The system also includes a laser operating at a wavelength suitable for exposure of the photoresist. The system also includes an optical system to deliver a laser beam at oblique incidence to the grating beam-splitter to expose the photoresist coated sample. The system also includes means to control an exposure dose of the laser beam. A system using two grating beam-splitters to provide increased alignment tolerance is also disclosed.
Issued Patent for “Modular Metal-Organic Polyhedra Superassembly Compositions”
Patent No. 12,208,164, issued January 28, 2025
Inventors: C. Jeffrey Brinker, Jimin Guo, Wei Zhu
(Ref. 2019-094)
A method to prepare a population of metal-organic polyhedra (MOP) supported micelle nanoparticles (NPs), and a composition comprising MOP supported micelle NPs, are provided.
Issued Patent for “System and Methods for PUF-based Authentication”
Patent No. 12,212,551, issued January 28, 2025
This technology is currently licensed.
Inventors: James Plusquellic, Derek Heeger
(Ref. 2020-113)
Authentication that leverages a Physical Unclonable Function (PUF) to generate bitstrings, session keys and long-lived keys (LLK).
Issued Patent for “Optically Switched Circuit Breaker with Cascaded Transistor Topology”
Patent No. 12,218,497, issued February 4, 2025
Inventors: Gregory Pickrell, Jason Christopher Neely, Lee Gill, Jacob Mueller, Luciano Andres Garcia Rodriguez, Jack David Flicker, Emily Ann Schrock, Robert Kaplar, Harold P. Hjalmarson, Jane Lehr
(Ref. 2022-088)
A disclosed switching apparatus, such as a circuit breaker, includes a transistor switch circuit connected between a power input terminal and a load terminal, and, connected to the power input terminal and bypassing the transistor switch circuit, a switchable bypass leg that is optically switched by a series-connected photoconductive semiconductor switch (PCSS). The transistor switch circuit includes at least one cascade of three or more series-connected transistors, and at least one resistor network configured to divide a voltage from a voltage source across a cascade of series-connected transistors. Operating the switch apparatus includes detecting whether a sensed electric current is in a fault condition, opening the transistor switch circuit upon detecting a fault condition, and then closing the PCSS so that the electric current is diverted onto a switchable bypass path. The opening of the transistor switch circuit comprises turning OFF a normally-ON transistor switch circuit.
Issued Patent for “Mineral Recovery Enhanced Desalination (MRED) Process for Desalination and Recovery of Commodity Minerals”
Patent No. 12,227,441, issued February 18, 2025
Inventors: Bruce Thomson, Kerry Howe, Ayush R. Shahi, Sugam Tandukar
(Ref. 2019-099)
A novel process for treatment of low quality or brackish water that allows increased recovery of high-quality water, recovers commodity minerals and reduces the volume of water and mass of solids that are disposed from the process.
Issued Patent for “Living Mammalian Cells Modified with Functional Modular Nanoparticles”
Patent No. 12,252,708, issued March 18, 2025
Inventors: Jimin Guo, C. Jeffrey Brinker, Wei Zhu, Jacob Ongudi Agola
(Ref. 2019-029)
An encapsulated living (viable) mammalian cell, and methods of making and using that cell, are provided.
Issued Patent for “Quantum-Computing Architecture Based on Multi-Dimensional Continuous-Variable Cluster States in a Scalable Platform”
Patent No. 12,254,381, issued March 18, 2025
Inventors: Rafael Alexander, Shuai Liu, Bo-Han Wu, Zheshen Zhang
(Ref. 2020-022)
A scalable platform for generating time-frequency-multiplexed cluster states and utilizing them for large-scale quantum computing. Kerr microcombs and continuous-variable (CV) quantum information are used to formulate a one-way quantum computing architecture that can accommodate hundreds of simultaneously addressable entangled optical modes multiplexed in the frequency domain and an unlimited number of sequentially addressable entangled optical modes in time domain. One-dimensional, two-dimensional, and three-dimensional CV cluster states can be deterministically produced using robust integrated photonic circuit technology is leveraged that is readily available and experimentally viable.
Issued Patent for “System and Methods for Producing Magic States for Universal Quantum Computation Using GKP Error Correction”
Patent No. 12,254,382, issued March 18, 2025
Inventors: Rafael Alexander, Nick Menicucci, Ben Baragiola, Giacomo Pantaleoni, Angela Karanjai
(Ref. 2019-085)
Applying Gottesman-Kitaev-Preskill (GKP) error correction to Gaussian input states, such as vacuum, produces distillable magic states, achieving universality without additional non-Gaussian elements. Gaussian operations are sufficient for fault-tolerant, universal quantum computing given a supply of GKP-encoded Pauli eigenstates.
Issued Patent for “Devices Comprising Distributed Bragg Reflectors and Methods of Making the Devices”
Patent No. 12,255,265, issued March 18, 2025
Inventors: Tito Busani, Daniel Feezell, Mahmoud Behzadirad, Morteza Monavarian, Saadat Mishkat-Ul-Masabih
(Ref. 2019-064)
A method for making a device. The method comprises forming a buffer layer on a substrate; forming a periodically doped layer on the buffer layer; forming one or more wires on the periodically doped layer, the wires being chosen from nanowires and microwires; and introducing porosity into the periodically doped layer to form a porous distributed Bragg reflector (DBR). Various devices that can be made by the method are also disclosed.