ALEXANDRIA, Va., July 16 -- United States Patent no. 12,359,679, issued on July 15, was assigned to GD MIDEA HEATING & VENTILATING EQUIPMENT Co. LTD. (Foshan, China) and MIDEA GROUP Co. LTD. (Foshan, China).

"Blower and air conditioner" was invented by Fuquan Wei (Foshan, China) and Baisong Zhou (Foshan, China).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A blower includes a volute, an impeller rotatably mounted within the volute, and a flexible protective member. The flexible protective member includes a mounting section and a limiting section. The mounting section is detachably fixed at an air inlet of the volute. The limiting section is inserted in an air inlet of the impeller and configured to prevent t...