ALEXANDRIA, Va., July 23 -- United States Patent no. 12,366,473, issued on July 22, was assigned to FLOW-TRONIC S.A. (Welkenraedt, Belgium).
"Non-invasive open channel flow meter" was invented by Jean-Marie Sevar (Welkenraedt, Belgium) and Martin Scherhaufl (Eidenberg, Austria).
According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A method measures surface velocity of a fluid having a free surface flowing through a pipe or a channel. A microwave beam is sent by patch antenna including an emitting patch area and receiving patch areas parallel to the emitting patch area. Microwave signals reflected by the moving fluid free surface are received on the receiving patch areas separated by a predetermined distance. The pat...