US Patent Issued to Vanderbilt University, University of Tennessee Research Foundation on Nov. 25 for "Surgical device tip with deflectable joint" (Tennessee, Washington Inventors)

ALEXANDRIA, Va., Nov. 25 -- United States Patent no. 12,478,445, issued on Nov. 25, was assigned to Vanderbilt University (Nashville, Tenn.) and University of Tennessee Research Foundation (Knoxville, Tenn.).

"Surgical device tip with deflectable joint" was invented by Katherine E. Riojas (Nashville, Tenn.), Robert J. Webster (Nashville, Tenn.), Daniel Caleb Rucker (Knoxville, Tenn.), Kaitlin Oliver Butler (Knoxville, Tenn.) and Ryan Ponten (Issaquah, Wash.).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A small diameter surgical tool implements an agonist-antagonist deflectable joint. The deflectable joint is an actuatable bendable structure that uses push-pull, agonist-antagonist action of a pair of nested ...