Motion is one of the most natural aspects of the human condition, and a large component of staying healthy. Artificial intelligence and machine learning technologies open the door to news ways of quantifying this aspect of human health and seeking solutions to improve it. This sector covers general activity, infant activity, medical and geriatric related activity, and nutrition powered by artificial intelligence.

Cardiac technologies have improved the human condition for a long time, but artificial intelligence and machine learning are making these technologies exponentially more effective. This sector considers cardiac advancement in terms of acoustic, biochemical, electrical, fetal, pacing, physical, thrombi, multisensory, and microbiome developments.

For almost any bodily system, research institutions and biotechnology companies alike are harnessing artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning to detect, analyze, and predict health conditions. Advancements in computational power and algorithmic potential have allowed for the application of machine learning, neural networks, and similar advanced systems in manners that were previously unavailable and on scales that were previously impossible.

The human brain is a diverse system impacting many aspects of health. Artificial intelligence provides not only a means to better understand the brain, but to better support it as health issues appear. This sector considers general brain function, mental state, sensory, sleep, substance abuse, trauma, speech, microbiome, and specific conditions of the brain.

Artificial intelligence and human health don’t stop with our general diagnostics, cardiology, neurology, and activity sectors. This sector covers AI/ML-centric advancements in auditory, dental, GI/hepatic, circulatory, immune, musculoskeletal, ocular, reproductive, respiratory, dermatological, urinary, rectal, and spectrometry related biotech.

Automated algorithms increase in breadth and accuracy when retrained and supervised by human experts. The analytical capabilities published by software platform, chipset manufacturers, telecom providers, and financial institutions describe the state of the art methods of classification and learning regarding vulnerability and traffic analysis.

Modern detection algorithms inspect, label, and react to the unexpected machine and social events observed outside of baseline activity patterns created from big data and telemetry stream analysis. The advantage of AI detection is an incident response rate faster than any human could ever hope to achieve manually.

Artificial intelligence algorithms quantify the risk of individual user access for secure information and enterprise systems. The dominant software platform providers and banks provide a variety of user identification techniques, including biometric and activity-based rules that grant or deny system access.

Global enterprises and governments are taking a defense in breadth approach to securing their resources and digital assets. Hardware and software providers are bringing to market a host of new offerings to help create consistent, reactive, global policies that prescribe methods for risk assessment, prevention, protection, monitoring, and incident response for cyber attacks on a policy level.

AI Enabled Search relates to the integration of artificial intelligence (AI) technologies and techniques with Internet search functionalities, with a focus on creating unique experiences curated for the individual user.

Safety is a critical component of the reason why many purchase the car that they do. Therefore, it goes without saying that manufacturers are clamoring to make sure their product has the most efficient, smartest and overall quantifiably safest sensing on the market. A prime example of capitalization is Samsung yielding more patents involving LIDAR sensing - it recently partnered with Innoviz, a vehicle perception specialist which has raised $38 million for the project. Volvo has been partnered with Baidu, the leading Chinese internet search company, and aims to release a level 4 (nearly autonomous driving except in off-road or adverse weather conditions). Bosch has made good intent to move in on this field as well, partnering with NIO to improve the reach of remote automobile sensing technology earlier this year. It is clear that this industry is exploding not only domestically, but also abroad. Due to a recent push from the European New Car Assessment Program to reduce the motor accident and fatality rate to zero, manufacturers worldwide are subsequently re-evaluating their safety standards. However, possibly the most marked growth would be attributed to the U.S., namely Tesla’s accelerated mission to create the world’s first genuinely driverless car. Additionally, remote sensing has proven to be valuable in emissions monitoring, popular in response to more stringent guidelines.

Investment in commercialization of autonomous and semi-autonomous automobiles using machine vision technology has been on the increase for recent years. Market growth and consumer and business appetite for using machine vision in these vehicles has spurred the investment directly and through M&A activity.

Automated Tire Sensors aim to reduce traffic accidents and tire wear and increase fuel economy through monitoring and early recognition of a hazardous state of the tires. With many global mandates requiring tire monitoring technologies in new cars, the tire sensor market is expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate of 15% over the next 5 years in China, and be a US$23.6 billion opportunity by 2026. Automated tire sensors could also become a major player within the autonomous vehicle market, with benefits such as decreased downtime and maintenance and improved safety.

The global need for sustainable packaging grows as awareness and regulation for greener initiatives are adopted by regulators and corporations. The Biodegradable Packaging Patent Forecast® is interested in biodegradable, compostable, or otherwise environmentally friendly packaging such as films, contains, wrappers, etc. Single-product packaging (e.g. single soda pop bottle, etc.) is not considered in this analysis.

As neurotechnology proliferates, applications spanning numerous and diverse applications are appearing, from neuropathy treatments to hands-free device control to content suggestion. Not only is this industry incredibly manifold and disruptive, it is incredibly lucrative as well, projected to reach $2.67 Billion By 2026.

Cannabis is now legally being used to treat a wide variety of medical conditions, including chronic pain, alcoholism, anxiety, nausea (from chemotherapy) and epilepsy. Additionally, the fact that it is a botanical means that there is room for development in plant cultivation and processing.

Collaborative robots are designed to operate in close proximity and sometimes in tandem with humans for a variety of applications including assembly and manufacturing, home care, and service work. Traditional industrial robots are not equipped to recognize or respond to human presence and are thus fenced off to ensure worker safety. In contrast, the International Federation of Robots defines four types of collaborative robot interactions in an assembly setting: coexistence, in which the robots are not fenced off but do not share a workspace with humans; sequential collaboration, in which robots and humans share the same workspace and have sequential actions; cooperation, in which robots and humans work on the same part at the same time; and responsive collaboration, in which robots respond in real-time to human movement.

Sleep plays an important role in personal health and wellness. Retail service and technology providers are integrating new data and sensory technologies to attract new customers and provide attractive products for health conscious consumers.

Demand response is a reduction in the electric utility power consumption by a customer in order to better match the demand for power with the supply. Electric utilities have traditionally adjusted supply to match demand; however, there are limits to these methods because some generating units are slow to respond, are very expensive to operate, and/or demand can exceed total power capacity. Demand response adjusts the demand for power instead of adjusting the supply through multiple methods, including simple off-peak metering, where tariffs are static, and smart metering, where tariffs are dynamic.

A digital twin is a real-time digital replica of a living or non-living physical entity. Data regarding the state of the physical entity is transmitted in real-time, which allows the digital twin to exist and simultaneously mirror the physical entity.

With the rise of the IoT and incoming use of 5G, the Edge Computing sector is poised to grow dramatically. Many companies have already begun investing in the Edge Computing future, as demonstrated by their patent portfolios.

Decentralization of the world's electrical power generation continues with the introduction of demand response, distributed generation, and microgrid technologies. This Patent Forecast evaluates the fundamental payment and settlement state of the art of clearing and processing energy payment transactions.

Direct Current Bidirectional converters are a key technology for energy storage because they can have multiple streams of DC power at varying voltages. Typically, these need to be integrated into a single current with a nominal voltage. This Patent Forecast is divided into two groups: converters which convert directly (DC/DC) and converters which convert DC into an alternating current and then back into DC (DC/AC/DC).

A flow battery, or redox flow battery, is a type of electrochemical cell where chemical energy is provided by two chemical components dissolved in liquids contained within the system and separated by a membrane. Advantages over conventional rechargeables includes separable liquid tanks and near unlimited longevity. Flow batteries applications include: load balancing, storing energy from renewable sources, peak shaving, UPS, power conversion, electric vehicles and stand-alone power systems.

A battery charge equalizer provides individual cell charging in multi-cell battery strings in order to maintain all the cells at the same charge. Keeping all the cells in a multi-cell string at the same charge state maximizes the battery's life and performance. Equalization techniques require electrical circuitry to achieve cell monitoring and balancing.

With the cannabis industry ramping up globally like never before, hydroponics technology has never been in as much demand as it is now. Hydroponic growing methods boast a multitude of positive qualities such as reduced pest and disease outbreaks, improved cultivation control, modularity, and much more.

Islanding is the condition in which a distributed generator continues to power a location even though electrical grid power is no longer present. Islanding can be dangerous to utility workers, who may not realize that a circuit is still powered, and it may prevent automatic re-connection of devices. Additionally, without strict frequency control the balance between load and generation in the islanded circuit is going to be violated, leading to abnormal frequencies and voltages. For those reasons, distributed generators must detect islanding and immediately disconnect from the circuit; this is referred to as anti-islanding. Microgrids are designed to allow for intentional islanding. In case of an outage, a microgrid controller disconnects the local circuit from the grid on a dedicated switch and forces the distributed generator(s) to power the entire local load. The microgrid controller must then synchronize generators and balance the generators and loads. Methods that detect islanding without a large number of false positives are an important aspect of this technology. Each detection method has some threshold that needs to be crossed before a condition is considered to be a signal of grid interruption, which leads to a "non-detection zone", the range of conditions where a real grid failure will be disregarded. For this reason, grid-interactive inverters are typically tested before field deployment by reproducing specific grid conditions and evaluating the effectiveness of the islanding methods.

Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs) are cryptographic hashes attached to pieces of digital media. With the increase in popularity of NFTs, there has also been development of digital marketplaces and platforms for creating, managing, and transacting NFTs.

With the rise of the internet, online collaboration has been more accessible than ever. Online multimedia collaboration and commerce connects artists through a curated network, enabling ease of production, financing, and fulfillment services based on the project’s needs.

Optical computing is the use of photons rather than electrons for computing architecture. Optical analogues for microelectronic devices can be used to generate, modulate, and process streams of light and perform computational tasks. Photon-based computing overcomes drawbacks of electron-based computing including quantum tunneling, which limits the minimum size of electron transistors, and electron drift velocity, which is much slower than the speed of light. Optical computing chips can be used in various sensing and imaging capabilities, especially those that require multivariate analysis or neural network applications.

Quantum Communication is the transmission of quantum information. Quantum cryptography is a practical application of quantum communication. The best known example of quantum cryptography is quantum key distribution which offers an information-theoretically secure solution to the key exchange problem.

Quantum computing is the use of quantum-mechanical phenomena, such as superposition and entanglement, to perform computation. This technology is exponentially more powerful than classical computing and holds the promise to solutions to problems heretofore unsolvable by classical computing.

While quantum entanglement may sound like something far off into the future, it's already being applied. Some example include medical imaging, computer gaming, and detecting chemical and biological weapon components. Click through to see what else is being developed with this phenomenon. The quantum entanglement forecast does not include quantum computing or quantum communication. These have their own separate forecast.

Securities Tokenization is related to tokenizing securities. The scope of analysis includes tokenizing assets on the blockchain and trading/transferring tokenized assets on the blockchain. This does not include trading whole assets on the blockchain, but rather trading fractional values of these assets. The assets to be tokenized can be financial assets (e.g., equities), or physical assets (e.g., gold). Chain Partners expects to see the Securities Token market size reach $2T by 2030 as more financial institutions enter and develop technology in this space.

Smart Cities: Electricity Grid focuses on power grid management and security within a smart city, not including the monetization aspects of the grid. Specifically, the sector focuses on using real time data to automatically adjust power distribution across the grid. Additionally, the sector includes documents relevant to tracking power usage across a grid, and ensuring grid security to prevent digital attacks on the critical infrastructure.

Smart city emergency services management involves the use of IoT technologies in enhancing data collection from physical environments and quickly communicating this to different city departments. Smart city waste management involves the use of IoT technologies to help cities optimize the efficiency of their waste collection. Cloud and edge computing advancements continue to push us ever closer to smart cities with optimized services, with Toyota currently working on bringing their "Woven City" prototype into reality.

Smart traffic control systems are designed to optimize the flow of traffic in a city to reduce congestion and lower travel times. To achieve this task, smart traffic control systems can utilize a combination of the internet of things, edge computing, and artificial intelligence. These systems range from the addition of new hardware to existing traffic control systems like stoplights, to data collection and processing systems that can predict areas of congestion and change traffic flow through manipulating traffic control infrastructure or directly communicating alternate routes to drivers.

This Patent Forecast was established to show patents that deal with the use of UAVs for both communication networks in a smart city, and retail delivery networks in a smart city.

Smart Cities: V2X focuses on the applications, infrastructure, and devices needed for vehicles to communicate with other devices.

Consumer demand has increased for wearable technology. Smart footwear has a wide variety of applications, including fitness, medical, team sports, video games, and virtual/augmented reality. According to a recent Market Research Future forecast, the smart footwear market is projected to reach a size of $6.51 billion in 2023, growing at a CAGR of 32%.

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Smart labels are any type of label, tag, or adhesive that can be affixed to an object that is not inherently smart device. The purpose of the label is to connect the object to the network and/or other devices on the network. The tag can then be used to track object location, item condition, inventory, prevent the item from being lost, stolen, or tampered with, etc.

This sector is directed towards thin film photovoltaics, but does not include perovskite, organic, or nuclear photovoltaics or photoelectrochemical technologies.

Speech-to-text closed captioning analytics is making people’s lives better. It has numerous benefits such as allowing greater accessibility and better comprehension for viewers. By using analytics, speech-to-text closed captioning would be more accessible to the masses who could then reap the benefits of this service.

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Unlike many industries struggling to adapt to modern technology, the world of sports has embraced technological progress and is at the cutting edge of innovation. This sector provides an insight into data analytics and data applications as they relate to sports and the athletics experience. Research by Markets and Markets projects the sports analytics market size to grow to $5.2B by 2024.

Sports betting could be one of the biggest industries in America, but up until recently, this multi-billion dollar industry was handled mostly by gray market bookies because Nevada was the only state where this kind of betting was allowed.  The 2018 Supreme Court decision Murphy v. NCAA invalidated the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act, the federal act prohibiting sports betting. These billions are now ripe for the taking. Although Nevada is still the market leader, other states and companies are looking to capitalize on one of the biggest opportunities of the decade.  Existing players such as FanDuel, DraftKings, Churchill Downs, and Cantor Fitzgerald are leveraging their already existing brand names and customer bases to take over the niche before other companies have time to spring up or pivot. Right now, sports betting is legal in only a few states, but as the states slowly legalize sports betting, new markets will open up every year.  Will a new challenger appear to contest these new states? Or will all the promise of this new industry be carved up by the established players?

Tesla, Inc has evolved from being known for their electric automobiles to now being known as a sustainable energy company. Offering many services such as solar panels/roofs, residential energy storage, and commercial/utility clean energy storage, Tesla Inc. has hundreds of issued patents, which are now considered open source because CEO Elon Musk believes in the benefit of allowing others to grow this technology platform when used in good faith.

Thorium is the base fuel for a nuclear fuel cycle that uses an isotope of thorium, 232 Th, as the fertile material. This thorium fuel cycle has several potential advantages over a uranium fuel cycle, including thorium's greater abundance, superior physical and nuclear properties, reduced plutonium and actinide production, and better resistance to nuclear weapons proliferation when used in certain reactors. The Thorium Patent Forecast® includes patents for all parts of the process necessary for a thorium reactor to operate, from reactor design to fuel mining and processing, to reactivity moderators, to alloys for manufacturing component parts.

Some of the most successful new companies, such as Uber and AirBNB, have taken advantage of a more connected world to monetize underutilized assets. In the freight industry, an opportunity may exist to monetize unused cargo space if a company can: 1) identify a carrier’s unused space, 2) locate a shipper who has need for that space, and 3) provide a platform for these two parties to find each other.

The sector limits its examination of the shipping process between the time when a shipper begins to choose a carrier to when the freight gets to its destination city. The focus of analysis is at the level of asset management (i.e. cargo/containers) rather than individual packages/consumer delivery. The Shipping Digital Asset Management sector primarily concerns itself with patents and patent applications that enable shippers and carriers to connect and take advantage of underutilized cargo space. As such, documents relating to the "last mile" and final item delivery are not included.

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Investment in Unmanned Aerial Vehicles for defense applications remains strong into 2020, with Boeing and IBM leading, but followed closely by independent inventors.