ALEXANDRIA, Va., Dec. 16 -- United States Patent no. 12,497,786, issued on Dec. 16, was assigned to UNILIN BV (Wielsbeke, Belgium).
"Ceramic tile" was invented by Bernard Thiers (Eine, Belgium), Christine Walmsley-Scott (Waldbredimus, Luxembourg) and Bart Van Der Stockt (Zwalm, Belgium).
According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "Ceramic tile having a ceramic base layer and a cover glaze layer including a printed pattern, where the surface of the ceramic tile has a relief having structural features corresponding to the printed pattern. The relief being basically formed as a plurality of excavations present in the generally plane upper surface of the ceramic tile and the structural features have a depth suc...