Re:Math professor's side mirror that eliminates 'blind spot'...
by mbreese on Friday June 08, 2012 @04:10AM
(#4083265)
He would be able to patent all curved mirrors, just his particular implementation and design. He may have an optimal design that certainly would deserve patent protection.
The question that he has to worry about with the patents is whether or not his 2008 paper was published before or after the non-US patents were applied for. If I'm not mistaken, the US has a one year grace period between public display (publishing an academic paper) and filing for a patent. Whereas Europe et al. do not have a grace period.
Re:Math professor's side mirror that eliminates 'blind spot'...
by pwg on Friday June 08, 2012 @07:11AM
(#4083652)
If you lookup the patent on the USPTO's system:
http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sec...
You will find that the ultimate filing date is Feb. 2007, and that multiple publications by Dr. Hicks were cited in the "Other References" area.
It's been a while since I have not driven a car that has a flat mirror near side (cost cuts and relative driver position makes far side less of a problem. Still, they're often not exactly flat either).
Cars here (Europe) generally have an improved version, as the linear radius was giving too much of a fisheye, which breaks depth linearity. The improved version starts with a quasi-flat mirror for the 2/3rd near the car, while the remainder has an increasing radius (Here's a shot [0]). The result is (when properly seated and mirrors set up) basically enough for the passing car to pop up at the edge of my field of vision when it disappears from the mirror.
[0] http://www.cleanmpg.com/photos/data/523/2007_Civic_iCDTi_Hat...