US 11340158

I'll search for this specific patent number and check for any CAFC 2026 litigation activity.

Let me check for any litigation or administrative proceedings involving this specific patent.

US 11,340,158 B2 — Summary

Note on data sources: The authoritative full text of the patent was supplied and I have treated it as controlling. Search results (Patent Leaderboard) corroborate the title, inventor list, and 2022‑05‑24 issue date. For the CAFC docket question, my searches returned no results for this patent number — see the litigation note at the end.

Bibliographic data

Minor observation: Google Patents renders the third inventor as "Dirk Nüßler," while one search result (Patent Leaderboard) renders it "Dirk Nüssler." I report this literally rather than auto-correcting it, but the Google Patents text in the supplied record uses "Nüßler."

Abstract (verbatim)

A system is provided for detecting non-metallic, non-aqueous substances in an aqueous sample, comprising a transmitter section, which emits electromagnetic radiation in the terahertz range towards the sample, a receiver section, which detects radiation components of said electromagnetic radiation which are modified by the sample and/or the substances therein and an evaluation section, which evaluates radiation components which are detected by the receiver section in order to establish whether non-metallic, non-aqueous substances are present or not in the aqueous sample, a transition of the aqueous sample from the liquid aggregate state into the solid aggregate state or vice versa taking place, radiation components which are modified respectively, for a plurality of different states of the aqueous sample, during this transition being detected by means of the receiver section, and the radiation components thus detected being evaluated by means of the evaluation section.

Plain-language overview of the independent claims

Claim 1 — the system. A THz imaging system that finds non-metallic foreign bodies (e.g. plastic fragments) hidden in water-containing food. It has three parts: a transmitter that beams THz-range radiation through the sample; a receiver that captures the modified (transmitted or reflected) radiation; and an evaluation unit that decides whether foreign bodies are present. The key twist is that the sample is deliberately taken through a phase change — freezing or thawing — while it is being imaged. Because water's permittivity and THz transparency change dramatically between liquid and ice, whereas a plastic contaminant does not, the receiver captures images at multiple states during that transition and the evaluation unit forms and analyses difference images taken at different times. Regions that stay constant (don't change with the phase transition) are flagged as foreign bodies. The claim also requires that radiation components be detected with respect to one or more parameters characterising the sample and/or the substances in it.

Claim 12 — the unit. A production/handling unit for aqueous samples built around a transport device (e.g. a conveyor belt) plus the detection system of the same general kind. Its distinguishing structural feature is a multi-transmitter / multi-receiver arrangement: several individual transmitters and several individual receivers are spatially separated from one another, each transmitter being assigned to exactly one receiver. Each receiver captures the modified radiation at the moment a sample is transported through the region between its paired transmitter and receiver, and the evaluation section processes the modified beam components detected by the group of receivers.

Claim 13. Not an independent claim in the usual sense — it is the "unit of claim 12 used for the production, assembly and/or packaging of foods as such samples" (a use/intended-purpose limitation appended to claim 12).

Briefly, the dependent claims

• 2: detection at a plurality of different, successive times during the transition.
• 3 / 9 / 10: the phase transition is caused by a converter section; specifically a temperature-changing converter; specifically a freezing section or a thawing section.
• 4: transmission geometry (transmitter and receiver on opposite sides).
• 5: evaluation performed on amplitude differences, intensity differences, and/or differences in sample permittivity.
• 6 / 7: an added optical imaging device; using visible-light wavelengths (stated range 350–750 nm).
• 8: SiGe-based transmit/receive devices in the transmitter and/or receiver section.
• 11: the characterising parameters include size/shape of the detected substance, its position or distribution in the sample, and/or its weight or volume proportion.

Litigation / CAFC 2026 docket status

• No CAFC 2026 docket, appeal, or US litigation involving US 11,340,158 was found in my searches. Queries for the patent number combined with litigation/appeal terms returned only unrelated matters (e.g. Smartflash, Aptiv/Microchip, Impossible Foods), none referencing this patent.
• Uncertainty caveat: I could not query the Federal Circuit's docket system or PACER directly, so I cannot positively certify the absence of a 2026 CAFC case; I can only report that no such proceeding surfaced. Treat "no known CAFC 2026 activity" as the current state of my evidence rather than a definitive negative.
• The only third-party proceeding-adjacent signal in the record is the EP 3610241 B1 European counterpart (active, with an ES 2965901 T3 translation); no opposition outcome is shown in the supplied material.

I'll research litigation involving US Patent 11,340,158 across patent litigation databases.

Let me try additional litigation-focused searches.

Let me search more targeted litigation databases for this specific patent.

Findings: Litigation Involving U.S. Patent No. 11,340,158

No litigation is known involving U.S. Patent No. 11,340,158.

Despite targeted searches of patent-litigation resources (including the Unified Patents litigation portal, CourtListener/RECAP dockets, and general web searches), I found no district court complaints, ITC Section 337 investigations, Federal Circuit appeals, or PTAB proceedings that name U.S. Patent 11,340,158 as an asserted or challenged patent.

What the patent is

For context, U.S. Patent No. 11,340,158 B2 ("System for detecting non-metallic, non-aqueous substances in an aqueous sample, a corresponding unit and a corresponding method"):

• Current assignees: Karlsruher Institut für Technologie (KIT) and Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft zur Förderung der angewandten Forschung e.V.
• Inventors: Johannes Meyer, Robin Gruna, Dirk Nüßler, Thomas Längle
• Priority date: 2017-04-12 (DE 102017206332.7); Filed: 2018-04-12 (PCT/EP2018/059418); Granted: 2022-05-24
• Legal status: Active, adjusted expiration ~2038-07-03
• Subject matter: Terahertz/mm-wave imaging to detect non-metallic foreign bodies in aqueous foods by observing permittivity changes during freezing/thawing.

This is a research-institute-owned food-quality-inspection patent. Such assets are typically licensed rather than litigated, and no assertion activity appears in the public record.

Important caution about false positives

My searches returned multiple hits for different patents that contain the digits "158" or similar numbers. These are not U.S. 11,340,158 and must not be conflated with it:

• U.S. 6,458,158 (LifeNet — bone graft patent, PTAB proceeding)
• U.S. 9,232,158 ("'158 Patent," Intellectual Ventures II / Toyota IPR2022-00709)
• U.S. 7,910,340 (Kaneka v. Xiamen Kingdomway et al., C.D. Cal. No. 11-cv-02389, and ITC Inv. No. 337-TA-790)
• Miscellaneous "158 Patent" references in Thermal Technologies v. Dade Service and the Delaware courtlistener docket (D. Del. 80439)

None of these involve U.S. 11,340,158.

Caveat on completeness

I cannot guarantee an exhaustive, real-time check of every sealed PACER filing or every litigation database, since some dockets (especially recent or sealed complaints) may not be indexed by public web search. Also note that U.S. 11,340,158 is the U.S. member of a family that includes EP 3610241 B1, DE 102017206332 A1, WO 2018189309 A1, and ES 2965901 T3. If you want me to look for litigation involving any of those foreign counterparts (e.g., in the UPC, EPO oppositions, or German courts), I can run those searches separately.

Bottom line: Based on the searches performed, there is no known litigation to report for U.S. Patent No. 11,340,158. If you have specific docket numbers or party names you believe are associated with it, I can verify those directly.

I'll verify the canonical "no proceedings on file" default against live sources before writing this up.

Let me run a couple more targeted checks before concluding.

PTAB / AIA Trial Snapshot — U.S. Patent No. 11,340,158 B2

Method note: The canonical source for this section is the structured "PTAB proceedings on file" block supplied in my instructions (USPTO Open Data Portal ingest), which returns no AIA trial proceedings for this patent. I ran supplemental web searches against the PTAB PTACTS portal, general litigation/PTAB coverage, and the patent-owner names to catch anything the ODP ingest had not yet indexed. Those searches surfaced no proceeding naming U.S. 11,340,158. I did not locate any proceeding number to report, and I will not invent one.

Proceedings overview

There are zero (0) AIA trial proceedings on file against U.S. Patent No. 11,340,158 — no IPRs, no PGRs, no CBMs, no derivation proceedings, and no pending petitions. Because there is nothing to break down by status (active / invalidated / sustained / settled / institution-denied), the only accurate composite is: 0 proceedings, 0 claims canceled, 0 claims sustained-through-trial. The defensive posture this gives a defendant is not "the patent is hardened by surviving attacks" — it is the more neutral and more informative posture: the patent is untested. All 13 claims stand exactly as issued on 2022-05-24, with no PTAB estoppel, no adverse claim constructions, and no cancellation to exploit. Anyone asserting this patent has never had a claim canceled; anyone defending against it has no free roadmap and would be the first mover.

Proceedings

None to report. No AIA trial has ever been instituted, denied, or terminated against U.S. 11,340,158. Consequently there is no proceeding for which I can supply a petitioner, panel, grounds, institution decision, Final Written Decision, settlement, or appeal — and supplying any would be fabrication. To be explicit about each field the task asks for:

• Type / Filed / Status: N/A — nothing docketed.
• Judge panel: N/A — no APJ panel has ever been assigned.
• Petition grounds: N/A — no petition has been filed identifying claims, art, or a § 102/§ 103/§ 112 basis.
• Institution decision: N/A — no § 314(a)/§ 324(a) decision exists.
• Final Written Decision: N/A — no verdict exists at any claim level. No independent claim (1 or 12) has been canceled; no dependent claim (2–11, 13) has been canceled or upheld.
• Settlement / termination: N/A.
• Appeal: N/A — nothing to appeal to the Federal Circuit, since no FWD has issued.
• Defensive value: The value is a negative-space asset: no PTAB record means no preclusive findings, no prosecution-disclaimer doctrine issues generated by a patent owner defending an IPR, and no Board claim construction a defendant can adopt for free. It also means the patent's validity has never been stress-tested by anyone other than the examiner.

Strategic summary

Claim status. Every claim of 11,340,158 is UNTESTED at the PTAB — none is canceled and none is sustained-through-trial, because no trial has occurred. The two independent claims remain as granted: claim 1 (the THz detection system with the phase-transition / difference-image requirement) and claim 12 (the production unit with spatially separated, one-to-one paired multiple transmitters and receivers). Dependent claims 2–11 and 13 also stand untouched. For a defendant, the practical consequence is that there is no claim you can point to and say "this one is already dead," and no narrowed surviving-claim set to argue around. Conversely, there is also no Amgen v. Sanofi-style or SAS-style amicus surface created by prior Board rulings.

Estoppel landscape. Because no IPR/PGR has been instituted against this patent, 35 U.S.C. § 315(e)(2) and § 325(e)(2) estoppel are empty — for any defendant. There is no petitioner and no privy who has already "raised or reasonably could have raised" grounds, so nothing is foreclosed. The full universe of prior art is theoretically available. Two caveats worth flagging up front:

1. § 325(d) and examiner-cited art. The nine references already of record (see the patent's "Patent Citations") include the two most on-point pieces for this subject matter — US 8,716,666 B1 (Emcore, "Method of detecting contaminant materials in food products") and EP 3 101 420 A1 (M2Wave, "Sensor for monitoring freezing status of products") — plus JP 2012 021880 A, US 8,716,666 B1's companions, and the Jördens et al. NPL reference ("Detection of foreign bodies in chocolate with pulsed terahertz spectroscopy"). A petition built predominantly on art the examiner already considered invites a § 325(d) discretionary-denial fight; a defendant should either rely on materially new art or be prepared to show the examiner misapprehended the prior art.
2. First-mover exposure. Having not been attacked for over four years post-issue (2022-05-24 to present), any now-filed petition will land in a PTAB climate where Director-level discretionary denial is more assertive and where settled expectations of a long-in-force patent are expressly weighed. Expect the patent owner — KIT and Fraunhofer, sophisticated institutional owners — to press Fintiv, § 325(d), and general-equity arguments, not merely to defend on the merits.

Pattern signals. None of the classic patterns are present: no serial petitioner, no repeat-filer campaign, no defensive aggregator (Unified Patents et al.) in the chain, and no patent-owner appeal activity, because there has been no adverse Board ruling to appeal. The absence correlates cleanly with the parallel finding in the litigation section of this analysis — no U.S. district court or ITC assertion has been identified either. Patents that are actively asserted tend to generate IPRs; this one has not. That is consistent with the profile of a research-institute food-inspection asset (KIT / Fraunhofer) that is likely monetized by license rather than litigation.

False-positive warning (important for any further research). My searches surfaced several unrelated matters whose numbers are easy to confuse with 11,340,158 and which must not be attributed to this patent:

• IPR2024-01158 — Reed Semiconductor v. Monolithic Power Systems, concerning U.S. 9,041,377, not this patent (the "01158" collision is the most dangerous trap here).
• U.S. 6,458,158, U.S. 9,232,158 ("'158 Patent," Intellectual Ventures II / IPR2022-00709), and U.S. 7,910,340 — all different patents.
• Sirius XM Radio Inc. v. Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft, IPR2018-00690 (FWD 2020-07-23), and the Coherus BioSciences IPR against U.S. 9,085,619 — these do involve a Fraunhofer entity as patent owner, but on entirely unrelated technology (audio coding; a biologic). They say nothing about 11,340,158.

Recommended next steps

If you are a defendant being asserted against (or receiving a demand letter):

• Do not cite a PTAB disposition — there isn't one. No claim has been canceled, so any argument of the form "the PTAB already killed claims X–Y" would be unfounded and potentially sanctionable. The correct framing is that validity is untested.
• Treat this as a clean-slate IPR opportunity, with two gates. (a) Build the petition on art that is not already of record — in particular, go beyond Emcore US 8,716,666 B1, M2Wave EP 3 101 420 A1, JP 2012 021880 A, and the Jördens NPL, or squarely address why the examiner misapprehended them, to pre-empt § 325(d). (b) Run the Fintiv/General Plastic and current Director-discretion analysis early, because a first-filed petition on a patent in force since 2022-05-24 will face discretionary-denial pressure.
• Statutory clocks, if you file. Institution decision is due within ~6 months of the patent owner's preliminary response (35 U.S.C. § 314(b)); the Final Written Decision is due within 12 months of institution (§ 316(a)(11)). Those are the only trial-stage milestones in play — there are no existing milestones to track in this docket.
• Check the EP counterpart separately. EP 3 610 241 B1 is the European member of this family (a cessation/opposition history there is not the same as U.S. PTAB activity and is outside this section's scope). If European exposure matters, that is a separate search.

If you are the patent owner / licensor:

• The clean PTAB record is a genuine asset — no estoppel, no adverse constructions, no amendments forced by trial. Preserve it by ensuring any license or assertion does not inadvertently hand a would-be petitioner a roadmap.

Verification / completeness caveat. I could not query the PTAB PTACTS portal or PACER directly by API in this session; I relied on the supplied ODP structured block plus web search. Settled or very recently filed petitions that are not yet indexed could in principle exist. I report "no PTAB activity on file" as the state of my evidence, not as a certified negative. For a definitive check, query the PTAB search portal at https://ptacts.uspto.gov/ (PTAB Center / PTACTS) for "11,340,158" and confirm against the ODP proceedings endpoint.

I'll research the assignment chain for this patent via the USPTO Assignment Center and related sources.

Let me look for the specific USPTO assignment records and reel/frame data.

Assignment & Ownership Analysis — US 11,340,158 B2

Source-access caveat (read first). I attempted to pull the actual reel/frame entries and correspondent-of-record data from the USPTO Assignment Center (https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/ and https://assignment.uspto.gov/patent/index.html) and from the legacy assignment PDFs. The searches available to me did not return the Assignment Center record for application 16/604,627 / patent 11,340,158. I therefore report the assignment events from the supplied Google Patents legal-events record (authoritative here), and I explicitly mark every reel/frame and correspondent field as NOT RETRIEVED rather than inventing values. This is a data-availability limitation, not a finding that the records are empty.

Inventors

Pattern note. The four inventors split 2-to-1-to-1 across two employers (KIT and Fraunhofer) and the two employers are the joint owners of the family. This is the signature of a KIT–Fraunhofer joint research group (a recurring arrangement: the same inventors Gruna and Längle assigned an earlier case, US 14/845,725 "Apparatus and method for controlling the quality of transparent objects," jointly to KIT and Fraunhofer — legacy assignment PDF at legacy-assignments.uspto.gov, URL appears to encode reel/frame 036737/0674, recorded 2015-10-06). There is no evidence of inventors departing an assignee within 12 months, and no evidence of a portfolio fire-sale. The dual-employer split is the ordinary consequence of publicly funded institute research, not an abandonment signal.

Minor literal-record discrepancy (carried over, not auto-corrected): the issued patent text and the EP family list the third inventor as Dirk Nüßler; Patent Leaderboard renders it "Dirk Nüssler."

Original assignee

• Named on the issued patent (front page): Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft zur Förderung der angewandten Forschung e.V. (Munich, Germany).
• Joint owner of the family (per the 2020-04-24 assignments and the EP 3610241 record): Karlsruher Institut für Technologie (KIT), Kaiserstraße 12, 76131 Karlsruhe (a German public entity / university).
• Line of business: Fraunhofer is Germany's largest applied-research organization (70+ institutes; the relevant unit here is Fraunhofer IOSB, Karlsruhe/Ettlingen, working in millimetre-wave/THz imaging). KIT is a public research university and national research centre.
• Status: Both operating non-profit research organizations; neither is acquired, dissolved, or in bankruptcy. Research-institute owners of this type license rather than litigate, and no litigation involving this patent surfaced in the prior section — consistent with a non-asserting holder.

⚠️ Contradiction to flag (per cross-reference rule). Google Patents' Current Assignee field lists both KIT and Fraunhofer, yet the Google Patents legal-events record shows a 2020-09-25 assignment recorded TO Fraunhofer with KIT as assignor, which on its face would leave Fraunhofer as sole owner. These two statements cannot both be literally true. The "current assignee" field is commonly stale (derived from the patent front page rather than from later recorded assignments), so the 2020-09-25 event is the more reliable single data point — but I could not retrieve the reel/frame to confirm which is correct. Treat KIT's residual ownership as unclear.

Assignment timeline

The three post-filing events below are the recorded assignment events shown in Google Patents legal events. I could not retrieve Reel/Frame or correspondent from the Assignment Center; those fields are marked NOT RETRIEVED.

• 2017-04-12 — not an assignment. DE priority application 102017206332.7 filed (the priority basis).
• 2018-04-12 — application event, not an assignment. PCT/EP2018/059418 filed by Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft; US national-stage entry became 16/604,627.
• 2020-04-24 (executed) / recorded 2020-04-24 — Reel NOT RETRIEVED
  • Conveyance: Assignment (as recorded on Google Patents: "ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS INTEREST (SEE DOCUMENT FOR DETAILS)")
  • Assignor: MEYER, JOHANNES
  • Assignee: Karlsruher Institut für Technologie (KIT)
  • Correspondent: NOT RETRIEVED
  • Context: Internal employer vesting — inventor→employer confirmatory assignment of the KIT-employed inventor's interest.
• 2020-04-24 (executed) / recorded 2020-04-24 — Reel NOT RETRIEVED
  • Conveyance: Assignment
  • Assignor: Nüßler, Dirk; Gruna, Robin; Längle, Thomas
  • Assignee: Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft zur Förderung der angewandten Forschung e.V.
  • Correspondent: NOT RETRIEVED
  • Context: Internal employer vesting — inventors→employer confirmatory assignment of the Fraunhofer-employed inventors' interests. (Same execution/recording date as the KIT link → the two employers recorded simultaneously, consistent with a single coordinated joint-ownership filing.)
• 2020-09-25 (executed) / recorded 2020-09-25 — Reel NOT RETRIEVED
  • Conveyance: Assignment
  • Assignor: Karlsruher Institut für Technologie (KIT)
  • Assignee: Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft zur Förderung der angewandten Forschung e.V.
  • Correspondent: NOT RETRIEVED
  • Context: Consolidation of co-ownership to a single institute (apparent KIT→Fraunhofer transfer). See the contradiction flag above: this conflicts with the "current assignee = KIT + Fraunhofer" field, so whether this fully extinguished KIT's interest is unclear.
• 2022-05-24 — Patent granted (US 11,340,158 B2). No post-issuance assignment recorded in the supplied record.

Status of the Assignment Center query: records do exist for this patent (the three 2020 events). What I could not obtain are the reel/frame numbers and the named correspondent/attorney of record. Do not read the "NOT RETRIEVED" entries as "no record."

Correspondent note (recurrence signal, used cautiously)

I could not confirm the correspondent for this patent. However, a related Fraunhofer assignment located during the search (US 14/795,063, "Time domain level adjustment for audio signal decoding or encoding," legacy-assignments.uspto.gov) lists the Fraunhofer correspondent as "All practitioners at Customer Number 27683." That suggests Fraunhofer records its assignments under a single institutional Customer Number rather than per-matter outside counsel. If the same Customer Number 27683 appears on this patent's 2020 assignments, it would be the expected institutional correspondent, not an NPE tell. This is offered as an unconfirmed lead only — the recurrence must be verified on the actual reel/frame before it is treated as a finding.

Timeline diagram

timeline
    title Ownership of US 11340158
    2017 : DE priority application filed
    2018 : PCT application filed by Fraunhofer
    2020 : Inventors assign rights to employers
         : KIT interest assigned to Fraunhofer
    2022 : US patent granted

NPE / troll-pattern signals

1. Shell-entity transfer — NOT PRESENT. No assignee in the chain carries an "IP / Patents / Licensing / Holdings / Ventures" suffix; both assignees are established German research organizations (KIT [public entity, Kaiserstraße 12] and Fraunhofer [e.V., Munich]). No registered-agent service addresses, no single-purpose LLCs. Evidence: the 2020-04-24 and 2020-09-25 assignees in the legal-events record.

2. Known asserter in the chain — NOT PRESENT. Neither current nor prior assignee matches any public NPE list (Acacia, Marathon, IV, IPNav, Wi-LAN, Conversant/Mosaid, Vringo, Pendrell, Innovatio, MPHJ, Lumen View, Round Rock, etc.). Evidence: full chain runs inventor → KIT/Fraunhofer only.

3. Repeat correspondent across the chain — UNCLEAR. The chain here is an internal employer-vesting pair plus one consolidation, all filed within five months in 2020 — a single coordinated event, so recurrence across "links" is not probative. The only correspondent datum I recovered (Customer Number 27683, from a different Fraunhofer assignment) supports an institutional in-house correspondent, not an NPE filing firm. Not a finding; flag for verification on the actual reel/frame.

4. Cascading transfers — NOT PRESENT. Two 2020 events on the same day (inventor vesting) plus one 2020-09-25 consolidation, all to stable non-profit owners — not a chain of LLC-to-LLC hops. Evidence: the three dated events; no assignee shares a shell-entity correspondent profile.

5. Pre-litigation transfer — NOT PRESENT. No infringement suit naming this patent exists (see prior Litigation section), so there is no assertion for a transfer to precede. Evidence: no litigation found.

6. Bankruptcy fire-sale — NOT PRESENT. Neither assignee has filed for bankruptcy; both are ongoing public/non-profit research institutions.

7. Privateering — NOT PRESENT. No transfer to an NPE asserting on an operating company's behalf; the chain ends inside the original research owners.

8. Defensive aggregator — NOT PRESENT (as an aggregator), but the practical effect is non-assertion. Chain does not terminate at RPX/AST/LOT/Unified/OIN. The owner is instead a university/non-profit institute that does not assert — a different mechanism reaching a similar "non-asserting" state.

Verdict

Defensive / non-asserting (nearest available category; see caveat).

The chain is inventor → KIT/Fraunhofer employer vesting (2020-04-24) → apparent KIT→Fraunhofer consolidation (2020-09-25), entirely owned by two public/non-profit German research organizations, with zero shell entities, zero known asserters, zero cascading LLC transfers, and no litigation. Every strong NPE signal is affirmatively absent, so no NPE verdict is supportable. Caveat: none of the four verdict options cleanly names "non-asserting academic/non-profit institute holder" — I selected "Defensive / non-asserting" because the chain terminates at a non-asserting owner, not because it terminates at a defensive aggregator. The single unresolved item is the KIT-vs-Fraunhofer ownership contradiction flagged above; if you can pull the 2020 reel/frame entries, that would resolve it.

Verify directly: https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/ (search patent 11,340,158) and https://assignment.uspto.gov/patent/index.html — neither record's reel/frame could be retrieved with the tools available here, so the above timeline rests on Google Patents legal events rather than on the recorded reel/frame themselves.

I'll research each of the nine examiner-cited references for US 11,340,158 to characterize them accurately.

Prior-Art Analysis — US 11,340,158 B2

Method note / scope. The authoritative full text supplied to me (the Google Patents record at https://patents.google.com/patent/US11340158/en) lists a "Patent Citations (9)" table, which is the examiner-cited art for this patent. I worked from exactly those nine references and did not substitute look-alike numbers (e.g., the "158" patents such as U.S. 6,458,158 / 9,232,158 flagged in the earlier litigation section, none of which appear in this patent's citation list). Network tool limits prevented me from pulling full detail on three Japanese/Chinese/German-language items; where so, I say so explicitly rather than fabricate content. All nine references predate the critical date of 2017-04-12 (DE priority), so all are facially available as prior art.

1. The nine cited references at a glance

All are cited "Cited by examiner" per the record. The patent itself also names U.S. 8,716,666, JP 2012-021880 and CN 104 181 122 in its Background section as known food-inspection art.

2. Reference-by-reference assessment

A. US 2004/0016744 A1 — Ottaway (RF energy conveyor oven)

• Full citation: US 2004/0016744 A1, Steven Thomas Ottaway, "RF energy conveyor oven," pub. 2004-01-29; granted as US 6,914,226 B2 (2005-07-05); assignee Comdel, Inc.; https://patents.google.com/patent/US20040016744A1/en.
• Description: A tunnel oven in which a conveyor carries food product between RF electrodes at 3–300 MHz; a controller varies impedance and monitors product dielectric/impedance changes, moisture and temperature during heating/pasteurization. No imaging; no foreign-body detection; no THz radiation.
• § 102 assessment: Does not anticipate any claim. Its frequency band (RF below microwave), purpose (heating), and absence of image detection all lie outside claim 1. It is only tangentially relevant to the transport/conveyor environment recited in claim 12 and to the "changing the temperature of the sample" idea in claim 9 — as a § 103 secondary reference at best, not § 102.

B. US 2004/0228371 A1 — Kolodzey et al. (THz sources/detectors on group-IV materials)

• Full citation: US 2004/0228371 A1, James Kolodzey et al., "Terahertz frequency radiation sources and detectors based on group IV materials and method of manufacture," pub. 2004-11-18; granted US 7,386,016 B2; assignee University of Delaware; https://patents.google.com/patent/US20040228371A1/en.
• Description: Electrically-pumped THz source and detector devices whose gain/absorption medium is a doped group-IV material (Si, Ge, SiGe) with intra-center transition at ~0.3–30 THz. It also expressly notes materials' transparency to THz and X-ray-like imaging possibilities.
• § 102 assessment: Does not anticipate any claim. It discloses a component (emitter/detector), not a detection system, and says nothing about aqueous samples, phase transitions, or difference-image evaluation. It is genuinely relevant to claim 8 (SiGe-based transmission-reception devices) — but because claim 8 incorporates every limitation of claim 1, anticipation under § 102 fails; it is a § 103 reference against claim 8's implementation choice.

C. US 2005/0270220 A1 — Baharav et al. (Optically-augmented microwave imaging)

• Full citation: US 2005/0270220 A1, Izhak Baharav, Robert C. Taber, S. Jeffrey Rosner, "Optically-augmented microwave imaging system and method," pub. 2005-12-08; prio 2004-06-08; assignee Agilent Technologies; related grants US 6,972,714 B1 and US 7,940,208 B2; https://patents.google.com/patent/US20050270220A1/en.
• Description: A microwave (1–100 GHz) imaging system augmented by a visible/near-IR optical camera; optical image information is used to constrain/construct the microwave image, to direct illumination to regions of interest, and to track object motion.
• § 102 assessment: Does not anticipate any claim. No phase transition, no permittivity-change evaluation, no aqueous food, no difference images. It is the natural § 103 reference for claims 6 and 7 (optional optical imaging device; visible 350–750 nm) and for the patent's stated motion-tracking/registration step — but those claims inherit all of claim 1's limitations, so no single-reference anticipation.

D. JP 2006-084423 A — Pentax Corp. (transmission image generation)

• Full citation: JP 2006-084423 A, Pentax Corp., "Transmission image generation method and transmission image generation apparatus," filed 2004-09-17, pub. 2006-03-30.
• Description: Pertinent to generating transmission images; I could not retrieve the specification in this session, so I will not characterize its disclosure beyond the title.
• § 102 assessment: On the face of the title, it concerns image generation, not non-metallic contaminant detection in aqueous samples during a phase transition. No apparent § 102 relevance to claims 1 or 12. Flagged as needing full-text review before a definitive call.

E. JP 2012-021880 A — Spectr Design K.K. (THz package detection)

• Full citation: JP 2012-021880 A, filed 2010-07-14, pub. 2012-02-02.
• Description: Detection of packaged articles using terahertz light (named in the patent's own Background). Concerns packaged-item inspection by THz radiation.
• § 102 assessment: Does not anticipate any claim. It addresses package/interior inspection, not the specific phase-transition/difference-image technique; no aqueous-food foreign-body determination. At most a background/§ 103 reference showing THz package-penetration inspection.

F. US 8,716,666 B1 — Emcore (contaminant detection in food by THz)

• Full citation: US 8,716,666 B1, Ronald T. Logan, Jr. & Joseph R. Demers, "Method of detecting contaminant materials in food products," filed 2010-06-10, granted 2014-05-06; assignee Emcore Corporation; https://patents.google.com/patent/US8716666.
• Description: Irradiate a food sample with a beam having frequencies ~100 GHz to ~2 THz; detect transmitted and/or reflected radiation; analyze to determine presence of contaminant (melamine and analogues). Explicitly performed at room temperature (about 7–32 °C) and can operate with sample in original packaging; contemplates scanning/3-D volume mapping.
• § 102 assessment: This is one of the two most relevant cited references — it squarely discloses THz-range radiation through food with transmitted/reflected detection and contaminant determination. It still does not anticipate claim 1 or claim 12, because it is silent on the two features that define this patent: (i) inducing a liquid↔solid phase transition and capturing images in multiple states during that transition, and (ii) forming/evaluating difference images of recordings taken at different times. Its express room-temperature operation arguably teaches away from the deliberate freezing/thawing step. Strong § 103 base reference (maps to the transmitter/receiver/evaluation architecture of claim 1 and the transmission geometry of claim 4), not § 102.

G. CN 104181122 A — Capital Normal University (pesticide in cereal by THz-TDS)

• Full citation: CN 104181122 A, Capital Normal University (首都师范大学), "Method for detecting content of pesticide in cereal by utilizing terahertz time-domain spectroscopy," filed 2014-08-06, pub. 2014-12-03.
• Description: Uses THz time-domain spectroscopy to quantify pesticide content in cereal (a dry agricultural product).
• § 102 assessment: Does not anticipate any claim. It is a dry-product, composition-quantification method (spectroscopy, not imaging); no aqueous sample, no phase transition, no foreign-body difference imaging. § 103 context for THz contaminant detection generally.

H. DE 102014111019 A1 — Miele & Cie. KG

• Full citation: DE 102014111019 A1, Miele & Cie. KG, "Verfahren und Haushaltsgerät," filed 2014-08-04, pub. 2016-01-21.
• Description: A method and household appliance (cooking/kitchen appliance context). Full text not retrieved in this session; I will not over-characterize it.
• § 102 assessment: No apparent disclosure of THz foreign-body detection during a phase change. No basis for § 102 anticipation of any claim. Possibly tangential to the patent's "end-customer oven" embodiment; needs full-text review.

I. EP 3 101 420 A1 — M2Wave bvba (Sensor for monitoring freezing status)

• Full citation: EP 3 101 420 A1, "Sensor for monitoring freezing status of products," filed 2015-06-04 (EP 15170744.5), pub. 2016-12-07; applicant M2Wave bvba; inventors J. Stiens, W. Vandermeiren, G. Pandey, L. Dimicolli; family US 2018/0164209 A1 and WO 2016/193487 A1.
• Description: Emits EM radiation with at least one frequency in 0.1 GHz–10 THz toward a product, receives radiation transmitted through or reflected from the product, and computes a "level of frozenness" by taking into account the product's dielectric properties via a physical-mathematical model or calibration data. It expressly recognizes that dielectric properties are not constant during freezing/thawing and depend on water/ice content; a related claim set covers a freezing or thawing system incorporating the sensor.
• § 102 assessment: This is the closest cited reference, and the most dangerous as a § 103 combination with F (Emcore) or B (Kolodzey). It discloses the frequency range, the transmission and reflection geometries, and — crucially — measuring radiation through a product while its state changes between liquid and frozen and leveraging the accompanying dielectric/permittivity change. It nonetheless does not anticipate claim 1 or 12, because it determines a degree/level of frozenness; it does not (i) target detection of non-metallic, non-aqueous foreign bodies, (ii) generate and evaluate difference images of recordings at different times to separate constant-permittivity contaminants from changing-permittivity food, or (iii) recite any optical imaging device (claims 6–7) or SiGe transceiver (claim 8). Relevance mapping: claims 1/2 (multi-state detection during transition), 3/9/10 (converter/ freezing/thawing section), 4 (transmission geometry).

3. Bottom line on § 102 vs. § 103

• No cited reference anticipates claim 1 or claim 12 under 35 U.S.C. § 102. Anticipation requires a single reference to disclose every element arranged as claimed. The inventive core here is the combination of (a) THz imaging of an aqueous sample, (b) a deliberately induced liquid↔solid phase transition, (c) multi-state detection during that transition, and (d) difference-image evaluation to isolate foreign bodies by their invariant permittivity. No one reference discloses all of (a)–(d). (Because dependent claims 2–11 and the claim-12 unit incorporate claim 1's limitations, they likewise are not anticipated by these references singly.)
• Closest art / likely obviousness combinations:
  1. EP 3 101 420 A1 (I) for THz/MM-wave radiation transmitted or reflected through a product while its frozen state and dielectric properties change — combined with US 8,716,666 B1 (F) for THz contaminant detection in food, and optionally US 2005/0270220 A1 (C) for optical augmentation (claims 6–7) and US 2004/0228371 A1 (B) for the SiGe emitter/detector (claim 8).
  2. F alone maps most of claim 1's system architecture and claim 4's transmission geometry, but lacks the phase-transition and difference-image features.
  3. I maps claims 2, 3, 9, 10 and the transmission aspect of claim 4.
• Secondary/background references with no § 102 bite: A (Ottaway), D (Pentax), E (Spectr Design), G (Capital Normal Univ.), H (Miele). These support the general state of the art (THz/RF inspection of food and packaged goods; spectral detection of contaminants) and are useful only in § 103 combination or as background.

4. Caveats

• Legal status is an assumption. The "patent citations" table reflects what the examiner cited; it is not a merits determination, and I have not independently re-verified every reference's full text.
• Three references (D = JP 2006-084423 A, H = DE 102014111019 A1, and to a lesser extent G and E) could not be fully retrieved in this session because the tool budget was exhausted. My characterizations of those four rest on their titles/the patent's own Background statements and are flagged accordingly; they should be confirmed against full text before any formal opinion.
• No litigation or CAFC 2026 docket involving US 11,340,158 was found (consistent with the earlier litigation section); nothing in that regard changes this prior-art analysis.
• Per the operating rule, I have used the supplied authoritative full text as controlling where it conflicts with any search result.

I'll research the key prior-art references cited on the patent page to ground the § 103 analysis.

Let me research the remaining cited prior-art references.

Obviousness Analysis — U.S. Patent No. 11,340,158 B2 under 35 U.S.C. § 103

Analyst note on scope. This builds on the previously generated bibliographic, claims, and litigation sections and does not repeat them. I use the nine patent citations and the non-patent citations listed in the "Prior Art" / "Citations" sections of the supplied Google Patents record. Per the strict rule, all identifiers are taken literally. All cited art predates the 2017‑04‑12 priority date and therefore qualifies as § 102(a)(1) prior art. Date discrepancy noted: the task frame says "April 26, 2026" while the system date is 2026‑09‑29; the priority‑date arithmetic is unaffected.

Important framing caveat (please read first). Every one of the nine patent references and the key non‑patent references was cited by or considered by the examiner on this record (all nine are marked "* cited by examiner"). The examiner therefore had these references before him and still allowed the claims. The analysis below identifies the combinations a challenger would run, and I flag where those combinations are strong versus weak. It is not a legal conclusion of invalidity, and no secondary‑considerations evidence is in the record.

1. Governing standard and the hypothetical PHOSITA

Under Graham v. John Deere Co., 383 U.S. 1 (1966), and KSR Int'l Co. v. Teleflex Inc., 550 U.S. 398 (2007), the inquiry is: scope/content of the prior art, differences between the prior art and the claims, the level of ordinary skill, and objective indicia. The prior art need only render the claim obvious, not anticipate it; a combination of references is proper where (A) known elements are combined by known methods to yield predictable results, (B) a known element is substituted for another, (C) a known technique improves a similar device in the same way, (D) a known technique is applied to a known device ready for improvement, or (E) the combination was "obvious to try."

Hypothetical PHOSITA. A person with a B.S. or M.S. in electrical engineering, applied physics, or physics, and 2–4 years' experience in millimeter‑wave/THz imaging hardware (sources, detectors, transceivers) and image/signal processing, with working familiarity with food‑industry inline inspection and freezing/thawing processes — or equivalent. This is a narrow, cross‑disciplinary field (THz hardware + food‑processing QA + image processing), which cuts both ways: it makes the combination easier to conceive, but the field is small, so the pool that would actually combine these teachings is limited.

2. Prior‑art inventory and probative weight

Note the family/citation asymmetry the record already reflects: Emcore (US 8,716,666) is the closest food‑contaminant reference; JP 2006084423 A (Pentax) and EP 3101420 A1 (M2Wave) supply the temperature/phase‑change teaching the Emcore reference deliberately does not use (Emcore prefers room temperature).

3. Claim 1 — element‑by‑element mapping to the primary combination

Primary combination: Emcore US 8,716,666 B1 + Pentax JP 2006084423 A + M2Wave EP 3101420 A1, optionally + Baharav US 2005/0270220 A1 and Kolodzey US 2004/0228371 A1.

Preliminary read: the only limitation that is not squarely and expressly taught by at least one reference is the "difference images" recitation. M2Wave supplies time‑resolved dielectric measurements across freeze/thaw stages; Emcore supplies THz imaging and analysis; the transformation of "successive time‑resolved images" into "difference images" is a routine image‑processing operation. Expect a challenger to satisfy this limitation via the KSR rationales in §4 rather than a single express disclosure.

4. Motivation to combine (KSR rationales)

4.1 Emcore + Pentax (the core combination). Both are in THz inspection of organic/food samples. Emcore's explicit problem is contaminant detection in food; Pentax's explicit problem is that water absorbs THz, so water‑containing specimens cannot be transmission‑imaged — and its stated solution is to freeze the specimen. A PHOSITA seeking to apply Emcore's contaminant detection to aqueous foods (Emcore's own claim 2/3 contemplate a milk product) would be directly led to Pentax's freezing technique: (i) same field (THz inspection of consumable/biological samples), (ii) same problem (transmission through water), (iii) predictable result (freezing raises THz transmission). This is KSR rationale (C)/(D) — known technique to improve a similar device in the same way. Jördens (NPL) confirms foreign‑body detection in food by THz was an active, recognized goal, supplying the "market/design incentive" rationale (F).

4.2 + M2Wave (why freeze/thaw during observation, i.e. temporal series). M2Wave supplies the missing conceptual link the diff‑image claim needs: it states the dielectric property is not constant during freezing/thawing and uses that change to determine a level of frozenness, and it monitors the process continuously ("time dependent monitoring," "measuring different stages of a freezing or thawing process"). Its stated advantage is that the product's interior/kernel state can be sensed (not just the surface), because radiation penetrates — the same penetration rationale the '158 specification uses. A PHOSITA combining Emcore's THz food‑imaging with M2Wave's observation that the sample's permittivity changes across the freeze/thaw transition would recognize that a foreign body whose permittivity does not change is detectable as the region that stays constant across the series — i.e. the difference‑image approach. This is a predictable, mechanical application, satisfying rationale (A).

4.3 + Baharav (claims 6/7 and the spec's own registration rationale). The '158 specification itself states the optical images help register mis‑displaced components and provide texture/contiguous‑area information, and that the two sensors must be geometrically calibrated. Baharav teaches precisely this: an optical (visible/near‑IR) camera combined with a microwave imager, using optical image information for registration, region‑of‑interest ID, and motion tracking, with a calibration object for sensor‑to‑sensor calibration. Adding Baharav is applying a known technique to a known device ready for improvement (KSR (A)/(D)), and the motivation is the '158 patent's own admitted need. Baharav also uses the visible/near‑IR range, matching claim 7.

4.4 + Kolodzey / Pfeiffer (claim 8, SiGe). Kolodzey expressly discloses THz sources/detectors based on group IV materials, which includes SiGe; Pfeiffer expressly discloses SiGe transceiver circuits for THz. The stated motivation is cost, room‑temperature operation, and solid‑state integration (the '158 spec itself frames SiGe as enabling a "competitive" system and credits the ~100–200 GHz resolution needed for ~1 mm bodies). Emcore's independent claim already demands "all solid‑state components and no moving parts," reinforcing the design incentive toward SiGe (simple substitution / known technique — KSR (B)/(C)).

4.5 + Ottaway / Miele (claim 12–13 context). Ottaway's RF conveyor oven supplies the conveyor‑transported food‑processing context for claim 12; Miele supplies the domestic oven/microwave scenario the '158 spec describes.

5. Dependent claims 2–11

Claims 2–5, 6–7, and 8 map cleanly onto M2Wave, Baharav, and Kolodzey/Pfeiffer respectively, so under KSR they would likely fall with claim 1. Claim 11's "weight, or volume proportion" is the weakest of the dependents for a challenger, since none of the cited art expressly computes a weight/volume proportion of a detected body (Emcore maps location but not mass/volume fraction) — this could require the added step of a routine geometric‑to‑volumetric computation, which a challenger would argue is conventional.

6. Independent claim 12 (the unit) and claim 13

Claim 12 adds two features beyond the system of claim 1:

1. A transport device (conveyor) carrying samples through the imaging region — disclosed by Ottaway US 2004/0016744 A1 (conveyor oven) and by the conveyor‑belt/bulk‑material embodiment of M2Wave; the '158 spec's inline conveyor is conventional.
2. A plurality of spatially separated individual transmitters and a plurality of spatially separated individual receivers, each transmitter assigned to exactly one receiver, each receiver detecting at the moment a sample passes between its pair, evaluated collectively. This is the multi‑transmitter/multi‑receiver inline array — the heart of a conventional production‑line imaging station. The '158 specification concedes such "transmitter‑receiver combination[s] … at various successive stations" are within the term "section," and the prior art of conveyor‑line EM/RF processing (Ottaway) plus multi‑element microwave antennas (Baharav's "antenna … composed of an array of smaller sub‑antenna elements") makes the multi‑transmitter/multi‑receiver geometry a predictable engineering choice. The spatially distributed transmitter/receiver pairs along a transport path is essentially the combination of Emcore's scanner + a production conveyor + an antenna array — rationale (A)/(C).

Claim 13 is a pure intended‑use limitation ("unit of claim 12 used for the production, assembly and/or packaging of foods"). Under In re Schreiber / Perry v. Riewald, an intended use that does not change the structure adds nothing patentable if the structure is otherwise obvious.

Weakness to flag: claim 12's "each transmitter assigned to precisely one receiver" with detection "at the moment of transport … through a region between the transmitter and the receiver" is a specific inline timing/geometry limitation. None of the nine cited references discloses this exact paired, spatially‑distributed inline configuration; a challenger would have to lean on the array teaching of Baharav, the conveyor teaching of Ottaway/M2Wave, and the '158 specification's own admission that such multi‑station arrangements are within the term "section." That is a plausible but not airtight obviousness case for claim 12.

7. Alternative and secondary combinations

• Emcore + Jördens (NPL) + M2Wave. Jördens supplies foreign‑body detection in food by THz; M2Wave supplies the freeze/thaw permittivity‑change basis. Where a challenger prefers a non‑patent primary reference, this trio targets claim 1 with stronger "same problem" motivation than the patent‑only set.
• JP 2006084423 A + US 2005/0270220 A1. If a challenger wants a single primary reference that already freezes the sample to enable THz imaging, Pentax is the best anchorage; Baharav then supplies the optical‑augmentation and registration (claims 6/7). The gap is contaminant/foreign‑body detection, which Jördens or Emcore closes.
• Emcore + M2Wave only (no Pentax). Weakest for the "transition" element because Emcore prefers room temperature; M2Wave's freeze/thaw monitoring would have to carry the transition limitation alone. Penn.

8. Counterarguments and limits of the obviousness case (must be weighed)

1. Examiner already considered all nine references. Every cited patent was "cited by examiner," including Emcore, Pentax, M2Wave, and Baharav. The fact that the claims nonetheless issued means the examiner found at least one limitation not rendered obvious — most plausibly the "generate and evaluate difference images" limitation combined with the detect during the transition limitation. A challenger must therefore overcome the examiner's implicit finding, not merely re‑assemble the same references.

2. Potential teaching away (Emcore). Emcore states its method is "preferably performed at room temperature" and warns that operating at cold temperatures (cryogenic range) "may … damage the food sample," while noting "in some examples cooled operation may still be desired." A patentee could argue Emcore teaches away from the freeze‑the‑sample approach. Rebuttal: instrument cooling ≠ freezing the sample; Emcore itself contemplates cooled operation and packaged/aqueous foods, and the '158 freezing step is "generally provided anyway" in food processing — so the combination is not contrary to Emcore's stated purpose.

3. Pentax is specimen/biological‑tissue oriented. JP 2006084423 A's preferred specimen is living tissue and its tool is transmission imaging, not contaminant detection. A patentee may argue non‑analogous field. Rebuttal: it is squarely in the same THz‑through‑water problem space; it need only be reasonably pertinent to the problem of imaging water‑containing samples.

4. M2Wave measures "degree of frozenness," not foreign bodies. Its purpose is process monitoring/control, not QC contaminant detection. A patentee may argue no motivation to look to it for foreign‑body detection. Rebuttal: it supplies the physical insight (dielectric property changes across freeze/thaw, interior sensing, transmission/reflection at 0.1 GHz–10 THz) that makes the difference‑image approach on an aqueous sample predictable; motivation may come from the problem itself (KSR (F)).

5. "Difference images" is the pivotal unresolved limitation. I could not locate an express "difference image" teaching in any of the nine cited references. A challenger's case on claim 1 likely turns on whether the combination of M2Wave's time‑resolved measurements with conventional image processing (the spec's own NPL [1]–[19] concede these are "known per se") renders difference‑image generation obvious. This is the strongest non‑obviousness foothold for the patentee, and I cannot resolve it as a factual matter on this record — it is a genuine, outcome‑determinative dispute.

6. No objective indicia of non‑obviousness in evidence. No secondary‑considerations evidence (unexpected results, commercial success with nexus, licensing due to the claimed invention, industry praise, failure of others) appears in the supplied record. The litigation section found no assertion activity; the summary notes research‑institute licensing, but licensing alone does not establish nexus to claim scope. Conversely, there is also no evidence of copying or long‑felt unmet need to bolster the obviousness case beyond the art itself.

7. Claim 11's weight/volume proportion is not expressly met by the cited art and is the most defensible dependent claim.

9. Bottom line

Most probable invalidity theory: Emcore (US 8,716,666 B1) in view of Pentax (JP 2006084423 A) and M2Wave (EP 3101420 A1), further in view of Baharav (US 2005/0270220 A1) and Kolodzey (US 2004/0228371 A1). The contested issue will be the "generate and evaluate difference images" limitation and, for claim 12, the paired spatially‑distributed inline Tx/Rx array — both of which the examiner presumably relied upon. I cannot certify invalidity; I can state that a reasonable PHOSITA with the cited art, the Jördens foreign‑body-in-food paper, and ordinary image‑processing skill would have had both the motivation and a reasonable expectation of success in arriving at the claimed subject matter.