PATENT CLAIM ANALYSIS

Application Number: 15898744
Application Type: Utility
Filing Date: 2018-02
Publication Date: 2018-10
Patent Classification: ["203", "019000"]

Abstract:
A method for separating ethanol from fermented biomass is provided. Fermented biomass that is rich in ethanol is used directly as packing material in a distillation column, and a small amount of water at the bottom of the column is used to efficiently transfer heat to the biomass at the bottom of the column. The fermented biomass packing has a high ratio of surface area to volume, making an efficient packing material. As vapor condenses on the biomass, diffusion of ethanol/water vapor from the body of the biomass enriches the ethanol concentration at the surface of the biomass. Droplets containing lower concentrations of ethanol drip downwards from the biomass, and vapors containing higher concentrations of ethanol rise upwards from the biomass, resulting in a higher concentration of ethanol at the top of the column than was initially in the biomass.

Claim (Index 1):
A method for separating ethanol from fermented biomass, said method comprising the steps of:\n (a) providing an ethanol-rich fermented biomass; (b) packing a vertical distillation column with distillation packing consisting essentially of said ethanol-rich fermented biomass; (c) adding a liquid consisting essentially of water to the bottom of said vertical distillation column; (d) heating the bottom of said vertical distillation column to boil said liquid water, thereby producing a bottom vapor; (e) cooling the top of said vertical distillation column to condense a top vapor, thereby producing an ethanol-rich top liquid; and (f) reintroducing a fraction of said ethanol-rich top liquid to the top of said vertical distillation column, wherein steps (d) through (f) are performed simultaneously.

Metadata:
- Claim Count in Document: 14.0
- Percentile: 88.0
- Lexical Diversity: 2.14286
- Patent Class: 203.0
- Transitional Phrase Type: half
- Component Type: 1
- Foreign Priority: False
- Related Applications: ['13809269', '12643468', '10035476', '15334430', '14389090']

Analysis Scores:
- 35 USC 101 Eligibility (BERT): 0.7269672486296599
- 35 USC 102 Novelty (BERT): 0.489167457475936
- Combined Prediction Score: 0.7031872695142876
- Mean Citation Score: 225.742764
- Max Citation Score: 248.7601
- Similarity Product: 215.78813464090825

Labels:
- Claim Label 101: 1
- Claim Label 102: 1
- Claim Label 103: 0
- Claim Label 112: 1
- Combined Label: 1
- Label 101 Adjusted: 1

Dataset: test