ALEXANDRIA, Va., June 17 -- United States Patent no. 12,312,604, issued on May 27, was assigned to UPM-KYMMENE Corp. (Helsinki).

"Controlling freeze-drying of a hydrogel" was invented by Marjo Yliperttula (Espoo, Finland), Arto Merivaara (Helsinki), Elle Koivunotko (Helsinki), Kalle Manninen (Helsinki), Sami Valkonen (Kuopio, Finland), Markus Nuopponen (Helsinki) and Lauri Paasonen (Jarvenpaa, Finland).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "The present disclosure relates to a method for controlling freeze-drying of a hydrogel wherein the method comprises adjusting the residual water content of the freeze-dried hydrogel, and to a freeze-dried hydrogel composition comprising nanoscale cellulose and a at...