ALEXANDRIA, Va., July 30 -- United States Patent no. 12,372,959, issued on July 29, was assigned to Deere & Co. (Moline, Ill.).

"System and method for autonomous work machine approval" was invented by Margaux M. Ascherl (Adel, Iowa), Jeffrey E. Runde (Cedar Falls, Iowa), Curtis A. Maeder (Johnston, Iowa), David A. Johnson (Durham, N.C.), Erich Wassilak (Des Moines, Iowa) and Mario L. Donini (Bettendorf, Iowa).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A mobile device includes a processor and memory, coupled to the processor, which memory contains instructions that when executed cause the processor to provide an autonomy management application. The autonomy management application includes an autonomy appro...