Morgan S. Heller II

University of New Hampshire Law School, The Franklin Pierce Center for Intellectual Property, J.D.; IDEA: Journal of Law and Technology, Senior Editor

Carnegie Mellon University, M.S., Robotics/Structural Engineering

Tulane University, B.S., Structural Engineering, summa cum laude, Tau Beta Pi, Phi Eta Sigma

Morgan’s career is peppered with accomplishments such as these:

• Regularly obtains patents for large U.S. and international corporations, universities, and small companies, as well as for high- and low-tech startups. He has also been successful in defending clients against IP infringement claims and in asserting clients’ IP rights against suspected infringers.
• Morgan’s diverse technical knowledge allows him to effectively work in and with a wide variety of technical fields and technologies, including:
  • machine learning / artificial intelligence, including deep learning, artificial neural network architectures (e.g., convolutional, recursive, etc.), and predictive algorithms in a variety of fields, such as machine vision (e.g., object recognition, object-movement analysis, etc.), facial recognition/matching, facial reconstruction, social-security-number prediction, multi-time-scale pattern analysis of time-series data, and dynamic data fusion;
  • enterprise and cloud-based critical event management software, including “next-generation” graphical user interfaces and integrated machine learning features, and integrated mobile-network mass alerting systems;
  • electrical energy storage systems, including redox flow batteries and lithium-based (e.g., lithium metal) batteries, and related electrolyte and solvent chemistries, battery management and control systems, packaging, and anode, cathode, and separator designs;
  • chemical synthesis, including for primary phosphines, low-temperature synthesis of semiconductor materials, hydrogen bis(fluorosulfonyl)imide, lithium bis(fluorosulfonyl)imide, and N,N-branched sulfamoyl fluoride compounds;
  • steelmaking, including steel compositions and converter-fume recycling systems;
  • chemical purification, including for vanadium-based electrolytes, hydrogen bis(fluorosulfonyl)imide, and lithium bis(fluorosulfonyl)imide and related salts;
  • electric vehicles, including eVTOL (electric vertical takeoff and landing) and eCOL (electric conventional takeoff and landing) vehicles, including avionics components and onboard network design;
  • microLED display assembly methods and systems; LED color conversion methods and structures; LED fabrication methods and equipment;
  • semiconductor fabrication, including many facets of individual fabrication steps, various types of circuitry (e.g., logic, clock dividers, memory, voltage dividers, error detection, memory, memory controllers), LED and FET fabrication methods and resulting structures, and chemical-mechanical polishing pad design;
  • sensors and sensor systems, including eye-movement sensors, electrolytic sensors, and constituent-chemical sensors, including fluorescence-based optical sensors electronic-nose sensors, and related sensing systems;
  • wireless communications, including secure pairing schemes, circuitry, and devices;
  • LED-base luminaire control systems, including spectral mixing control, and data communication;
  • microscopy, including light-sheet microscopy, brightfield microscopy, automated 3D-model construction and mapping from histological sections, and nematode-tracking software;
  • injection-molding hot-runners, including configurations and fabrication techniques;
  • microfluidics systems, including mixing channel configurations and laminar flow configurations;
  • turbomachinery, including dynamometers, turbines, hydrogen compressors, turbochargers, and high-pressure supercritical reactors;
  • wind turbines, including generators; power converters; support structures, and construction schemes and techniques;
  • electrochromic materials and systems, and products including such materials and systems;
  • spacecraft propulsion systems, including microthrusters, propellant mixing chamber configurations, and non-toxic;
  • blockchain applications, including logistics tracking, implementing Internet of things services, multilayer payment schemes, and user-identify authentication;
  • fuel cells, including direct-methanol fuel cells; and
  • “low-tech” consumer products.
• When clients desire foreign IP protection and circumstances permit, Morgan works closely with Downs Rachlin’s network of foreign associates that enables clients to seek IP protection in virtually any country in the world.
• Performs freedom-to-operate, (non)infringement and (in)validity studies as appropriate for each situation. He also prepares formal opinion letters based on these studies when advisable. If needed, Morgan prepares or responds to “cease and desist” letters, depending upon the client’s position in the dispute. Morgan also assists in settlement negotiations and, if litigation is unavoidable, he provides patent litigation support to Downs Rachlin’s experienced IP trial lawyers, especially skilled legal analyses of the patent-law issues at hand.
• Provides general IP counseling, including IP management and strategy counseling, and works with Downs Rachlin’s other IP and non-IP lawyers to provide clients with a vast array of legal services backed by the field-specific focused experience that the other Downs Rachlin lawyers bring to the table.
• Prior to becoming a patent attorney, Morgan had seven years of practical experience as an engineer with Raytheon Engineers & Constructors on many large and small projects in the fossil-fuel power generation industry. During his time as an engineer, Morgan co-authored one of Raytheon’s in-house design manuals for flue-gas desulfurization facilities, which became essential for many fossil fuel generating plants under the Clean Air Act of 1990.

Pennsylvania, 1998 (Inactive)

U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, 1999

Vermont, 2002

U.S. District Court, District of Vermont, 2014

Speaker, Introduction to Intellectual Property: An Overview of Patents, Trademarks, Copyrights and Trade Secrets, University of Vermont Honors Class (Burlington, Vermont, 2005)

Speaker, Patent Infringement, InventVermont Educational/Networking Session (Colchester, Vermont, January 12, 2006)

Speaker, Product Design: Trademark, Patent or Public Domain Webinar, Downs Rachlin Martin PLLC (Burlington, Vermont, January 14, 2011)