ALEXANDRIA, Va., Dec. 23 -- United States Patent no. 12,506,997, issued on Dec. 23, was assigned to SHENZHEN SHOKZ Co. LTD. (Shenzhen, China).

"Earphone" was invented by Zeying Zheng (Shenzhen, China), Jiang Xu (Shenzhen, China), Yonggen Wang (Shenzhen, China), Haofeng Zhang (Shenzhen, China), Gan Lai (Shenzhen, China), Chong Wang (Shenzhen, China), Liwei Wang (Shenzhen, China), Ruixin Han (Shenzhen, China), Lei Zhang (Shenzhen, China), Junjiang Fu (Shenzhen, China), Yongjian Li (Shenzhen, China), Tao Zhao (Shenzhen, China), Peigeng Tong (Shenzhen, China), Guolin Xie (Shenzhen, China), Duoduo Wu (Shenzhen, China), Ao Ji (Shenzhen, China) and Xin Qi (Shenzhen, China).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Offic...