ALEXANDRIA, Va., June 12 -- United States Patent no. 12,296,368, issued on May 13, was assigned to DREISTERN GmbH & Co. KG (Schopfheim, Germany).

"Method for joining edges and/or surfaces of a profile, joining roller arrangement and profiling installation" was invented by Tilman Traub (Neuenburg, Germany) and Christoph Grullich (Schopfheim, Germany).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A method for joining edges and/or surfaces of a profile in a profiling installation for longitudinally forming a virtually endless material strip into an at least partially closed profile shape. The material strip or profile is formed roll forming tools into a profile which is closed or partially closed, and is fixed ...