Smartphone radiation has long been an industry issue, though one that seems to never go beyond big headlines. In 2019 it was reported by Healthline that "iPhone radiation was reportedly the worst of any smartphone tested. The Tribune reported the iPhone 7 measured over the legal safety limit and more than double what Apple reported to federal regulators from its own testing."

Patently Apple discovered a patent filing two weeks ago that relates to techniques for controlling Specific Absorption Rate (SAR) of radio energy transmission; a top of both interest and importance to Apple fans who may be concerned about radiation from iPhones. Apple's patent clearly demonstrates their commitment to ensuring that iPhone radiation is safe levels at all times.

In particular, the patent relates to a radio device and a method for controlling radio energy transmission of a plurality of radio entities to comply with a predefined SAR requirement. The disclosure further relates to a method for dynamic management of a SAR budget across multiple radio entities.

Apple's patent FIG. 1 below is a schematic diagram illustrating RF energy absorption by a human body (#101) and a SAR restriction (#112).

This is a technical patent that also happens to be a "continuation patent." Apple has cancelled their original 26 patent claims defining their invention and replaced them with 20 new claims numbered 26-45 to ensure that they retain the invention's "granted patent status." Below are a few of the new key claims.

New Claim #26: "A radio device, comprising: a plurality of radio entities configured to transmit radio energy; and a controller communicatively coupled to the plurality of radio entities and configured to assign time quotas to the plurality of the radio entities over multiple time windows, the time quotas defining periods of time for which the plurality of radio entities are permitted to transmit radio energy to comply with a predefined requirement for maximum radio frequency (RF) energy absorption by a human body when using the radio device, and cause the plurality of radio entities to transmit the radio energy based on the time quotas."

New patent Claim #27: "The radio device of claim 26, wherein the predefined requirement comprises a predefined Specific Absorption Rate (SAR) requirement."

New Patent Claim #28: "The radio device of claim 26, wherein the controller is configured to enable at least two radio entities of the plurality of radio entities operating concurrently based on a shared transmission power restriction allowing the at least two radio entities to transmit up to a 100% duty cycle without violating the predefined requirement."

New Patent Claim #34: "A method for wireless communication comprising: assigning, by a controller, a first time quota to a first radio entity and a second time quota to a second radio entity associated with a radio device, the first time quota and the second time quota defining periods of time for which the first radio entity and the second radio entity, respectively, are permitted to transmit a respective radio energy to comply with a predefined requirement for maximum radio frequency (RF) energy absorption by a human body; transmitting, by the first radio entity, the respective radio energy for a transmission time up to the first time quota; and transmitting, by the second radio entity, the respective radio energy for a transmission time up to the second time quota."

New Patent Claim #40: "A radio device, comprising: a plurality of radio entities configured to transmit radio energy; and a controller communicatively coupled to the plurality of radio entities and configured to apply a transmission power restriction to the plurality of radio entities that restricts a cumulative transmit power of the plurality of radio entities to a predefined transmission power quota; and control the plurality of radio entities based on the transmission power restriction."

New Patent Claim #45: "The radio device of claim 44, wherein the moving average filter comprises an infinite impulse response (IIR) auto-regressive moving average (ARMA) filter or a finite impulse response (FIR) moving average (MA) filter."

To review the remaining 16 new patent claims and the patent in general, review Apple's continuation patent 20210218432 that was published today by the U.S. Patent Office on July 15, 2021. You could also review Apple's Euro filing here.

New Trademark Filings

Apple has also filed a few trademark applications in the U.S., Hong Kong and London (for the EU). In the U.S. Apple has filed for the figurative "MusicKit' trademark. Apple also filed for the "Southern Accents Radio" text-only trademark in Hong Kong and London.

(Click on image to Enlarge)

(Click on image to Enlarge)

Apple's supplied "Specimen" to USPTO was the Developer page covering MusicKit.

Apple filed their figurative trademark for MusicKit under International Classes 009 and 042 as follows:

009: "Computer software used in developing other software applications; application development software."

042: "Non-downloadable computer software used in developing other software applications; Non-downloadable application development software."

Apple also filed for the trademark "Southern Accents Radio" in London under application # 018518091 and in Hong Kong under application # 305693374.

Both were filed under International Class 041 covering: "Entertainment services, namely providing an ongoing radio program in the field of music; production and distribution of radio programs, podcasts and sound recordings in the field of music; entertainment services, namely providing ongoing podcasts in the fields of entertainment and music; provision of information relating to music; entertainment services, namely curating songs for music playlists; entertainment services, namely compiling and publishing music playlists; providing non-downloadable customized music playlists via the internet and other communications networks; selecting non-downloadable music recordings to create musical playlists for others and publishing those musical playlists; providing a website portal featuring links to musical sound recordings; provision of live entertainment, namely, musical performances."