ALEXANDRIA, Va., June 10 -- United States Patent no. 12,290,631, issued on May 6, was assigned to Altria Client Services LLC (Richmond, Va.).
"Electronic smoking article" was invented by Srinivasan Janardhan (Glen Allen, Va.), Georgios D. Karles (Richmond, Va.), Yezdi B. Pithawalla (Midlothian, Va.), Gerd Kobal (Sandy Hook, Va.) and San Li (Midlothian, Va.).
According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "An electronic smoking article includes a reservoir including a liquid aerosol formulation, a heater operable to at least partially volatilize the liquid aerosol formulation and form an aerosol and a spiral path insert including a channel having a spiral configuration along an outer periphery of the spiral path...