The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Apr. 14, 2025
Filed:
Sep. 27, 2022
Mikron Corporation Denver, Englewood, CO (US);
Tod Sean Hewitt, Bennett, CO (US);
Giridhar Shamsunder, Pittsboro, NC (US);
Michael B. Gunner, Highlands Ranch, CO (US);
Flavio Pointet, Denver, CO (US);
Mikron Corporation Denver, Englewood, CO (US);
Abstract
A method and apparatus are provided for handling beads such as lyophilized beads or cryo beads to enable reliable singulation of the beads and facilitate accurate dosing. The bead handling equipment () includes an equipment housing () containing a hopper () and a bead dispenser (), a gas delivery system (), and an inspection system (). The housingmay be pressurized by supplying pressurized gas to the housingfrom the gas delivery system. The bead dispenser includes a pistonoperative to singulate individual beads from the stream of beads exiting the hopperand to deliver individual beads to a feed channeland to a container. The inspection systemidentifies bead fragments, or beads that are otherwise mis-sized, so that such beads can be rejected and not delivered to the container