ALEXANDRIA, Va., March 24 -- United States Patent no. 12,584,288, issued on March 24.
"Seabed resource lifting apparatus" was invented by Takatoshi Kodaira (Tokyo) and Ichiro Nakatani (Tokyo).
According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "The present invention relates to a system and its equipments to collect mineral ores on the seabed and to float them up to the sea surface by utilizing the buoyancy of a liquid having a specific gravity less than that of water at room temperature. It is an underwater navigator capable of autonomous navigation that descends at a specific gravity of around 1.0 with a ballast that cancels buoyancy when descending from the sea surface, and ascends at a specific gravity of around...