ALEXANDRIA, Va., Dec. 9 -- United States Patent no. 12,491,731, issued on Dec. 9.
"Resilient wheels" was invented by Patrick Timothy Donohue (Portland, Ore.).
According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A resilient wheel and a method for traversing an obstruction therewith are disclosed. The wheel comprises a hub assembly, a flexible rim, and a spoke band assembly extending from the hub assembly to the flexible rim to form spokes. Each spoke has a spoke length defined to be a distance along the spoke from a point of contact of the spoke on the flexible rim to a point of origin of the spoke at the hub assembly. The spoke band assembly is configured such that contact of the flexible rim with an object as the ...