ALEXANDRIA, Va., Feb. 3 -- United States Patent no. 12,540,734, issued on Feb. 3, was assigned to WHIRLPOOL Corp. (Benton Harbor, Mich.).
"Multi-function cooktop slider controls" was invented by Marco Cammarata (Besozzo, Italy), Priscilla Rosaria Conforti (Montalto Uffugo, Italy), Andrea Gallivanoni (Casorate Sempione, Italy), Andrea Gasparoni (Comerio, Italy) and Annalisa Pacioni (Bresso, Italy).
According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A user interface having a multi-function slider control of a cooktop is provided. The slider control includes an array of individually controllable light elements defining a scale and is configured to be touch sensitive to receive selection of a value along the scale. A ...