ALEXANDRIA, Va., July 3 -- United States Patent no. 12,344,178, issued on July 1, was assigned to Ford Global Technologies LLC (Dearborn, Mich.).
"Sensor assembly with airbag" was invented by Tyler D. Hamilton (Farmington, Mich.), Michael Robertson Jr. (Garden City, Mich.) and Venkatesh Krishnan (Canton, Mich.).
According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "An assembly includes a housing. The assembly includes an optical sensor supported within the housing. The assembly includes an airbag supported within the housing and deployable from a stowed position internal of the housing to an inflated position external of the housing. The airbag in the inflated position adjacent the optical sensor."
The patent was fi...