ALEXANDRIA, Va., July 30 -- United States Patent no. 12,373,635, issued on July 29, was assigned to PFAQUTRUMA RESEARCH LLC (Wilmington, Del.).

"System and methods of virtual world interaction" was invented by Brian Shuster (Vancouver, Canada), Aaron Burch (Vancouver, Canada), Friso Kristiansen (Vancouver, Canada), Ian Neufeld (Burnaby, Canada), Dirk Herling (Vancouver, Canada), Patrick Tyroler (Vancouver, Canada) and Gary Shuster (Vancouver, Canada).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "Systems and methods of virtual world interaction, operation, implementation, instantiation, creation, and other functions related to virtual worlds (note that where the term "virtual world" is used herein, it is to b...