US Patent Issued to The Boeing on Dec. 2 for "Artificial potential field-based boom guidance for automated air-to-air refueling" (Washington Inventors)

ALEXANDRIA, Va., Dec. 2 -- United States Patent no. 12,486,040, issued on Dec. 2, was assigned to The Boeing Co. (Arlington, Va.).

"Artificial potential field-based boom guidance for automated air-to-air refueling" was invented by Daniel Michael O'Shea (Seattle) and Shawn M. Chamberlain (Federal Way, Wash.).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A trajectory planning system for a refueling boom includes a human-machine interface ("HMI") device and an electronic control unit ("ECU"). The HMI device outputs electronic control signals, in response to which the ECU performs a method. The ECU accesses a three-dimensional ("3D") boundary model of the receiver and a 3D model of the boom. The ECU calculates a...