ALEXANDRIA, Va., Sept. 8 -- United States Patent no. 12,727,731, issued on Sept. 8, was assigned to Omachron Intellectual Property Inc. (Hampton, Canada).

"Surface cleaning apparatus" was invented by Wayne Ernest Conrad (Hampton, Canada), Daniel Innes (Worthing, Great Britain), Dave Petersen (Bowmanville, Canada) and Adam Udy (Eastbourne, Great Britain).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A wet/dry surface cleaner has a surface cleaning head and an upright section moveably mounted to the surface cleaning head between an upright storage position and a reclined surface cleaning position. A solid and liquid separation stage is removably positionable on the upright section. The solid and liquid separat...