ALEXANDRIA, Va., Nov. 3 -- United States Patent no. 12,781,896, issued on Nov. 3, was assigned to Nantong Triflo Valve Co. Ltd. (Nantong, China).

"Quick-installation equal-radius straight-way joint structure and use method thereof" was invented by Xinyu Liang (Nantong, China), Senyang Li (Nantong, China) and Wei Tang (Nantong, China).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A quick-installation equal-radius straight-way joint structure includes a first shell, second shells, positioning blocks, support pins, and retaining rings. The first shell is a hollow cylindrical or branched structure arranged horizontally, and left and right side surfaces of the first shell are each concentrically provided with the...