ALEXANDRIA, Va., March 5 -- United States Patent no. 12,239,044, issued on March 4.
"Converging row unit for potato planter" was invented by Rainer Borgmann (Idaho Falls, Idaho), Evan Steel (Blackfoot, Idaho), Jason Steinkamp (Blackfoot, Idaho) and Henrik Wulferding (Ehrenburg, Germany).
According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A converging row unit for planting seed potatoes includes a plurality of linear arrays of seed cups, each array disposed upon a flexible endless belt and having an upwardly moveable portion and a downwardly moveable portion. The upwardly moveable portion passes through a seed pick region wherein each seed cup can draw a seed, while the downwardly moveable portion progresses to a p...