US Patent Issued to Bridgestone Europe, NV/SA on April 14 for "Hydrophobic patterns for tire tread grooves" (Belgian, Japanese Inventors)

ALEXANDRIA, Va., April 15 -- United States Patent no. 12,600,176, issued on April 14, was assigned to Bridgestone Europe, NV/SA (Zaventem, Belgium).

"Hydrophobic patterns for tire tread grooves" was invented by Shimpei Maeda (Tokyo), Pasquale Agoretti (Zaventem, Belgium) and Giuseppe Rodriquez (Zaventem, Belgium).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A tread for a pneumatic tyre, the tread comprising a plurality of grooves, the grooves comprising: a groove surface (122); and a plurality of elements (410) spaced from one another in an arrangement on the groove surface (122). Each element (410) has a shape defining a volume, the shape including: a first cross-sectional shape (425) in a plane (420) para...