ALEXANDRIA, Va., Dec. 2 -- United States Patent no. 12,485,004, issued on Dec. 2, was assigned to Medtronic Inc. (Minneapolis).
"Stents for prosthetic heart valves" was invented by Gianfranco M. Pellegrini (Santa Rosa, Calif.), Mike Krivoruchko (Forestville, Calif.), Finn Rinne (Santa Rosa, Calif.) and Matthew Rust (Windsor, Calif.).
According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A prosthetic valve including a wire frame having a generally tubular body portion, an interior area, a longitudinal axis, a first end comprising a plurality of crowns, and a second end comprising a greater number of crowns than the first end. The wire frame includes a plurality of adjacent rows of modified diamond-shaped structures ex...