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Patent law

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United States patent law was established "to promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries;"[1] as provided in the United States Constitution. Congress implemented these protections as a first-to-invent patent legal framework. By contrast, all other national patent laws are first-to-file systems. The provisions of the law are laid out in Title 35 of the United States Code (U.S.C.) and give authority for the United States Patent and Trademark Office.[2] This system is permitted by Article One, Section 8(8) of the U.S. Constitution.

In the U.S., a patent is a right to exclude others from making, using, selling, offering for sale, exporting components to be assembled into an infringing device outside the U.S., importing the product of a patented process practiced outside the U.S., inducing others to infringe, offering a product specially adapted for practice of the patent, and a few other very carefully defined categories. Thus, merely thinking about an invention, or drawing a diagram, is not an infringement. Research for "purely philosophical" inquiry is not an infringement, but research directed to commercial purposes is - unless the research is directed toward obtaining approval of the Food and Drug Administration for introduction of a generic version of a patented drug.

Under current US law, the term of patent is 20 years from the earliest claimed filing date, plus patent term extension.

[edit] Procedure

[edit] Pre-grant publication (PG Pub)

The United States Patent and Trademark Office publishes patent applications 18 months after they are filed. This time limit can be extended under certain circumstances for an additional fee. The applications are published before a patent has been granted on them.

[edit] See also

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US Patent Law

[edit] Concepts

[edit] Legislation

• Patent Act of 1790, First Patent Act - April 7, 1790
• Title 35 of the United States Code
• American Inventors Protection Act (AIPA)
• Bayh-Dole Act
• Invention Secrecy Act (1951)
• Patent Reform Act of 2005
• Patent Reform Act of 2007
• Plant Patent Act (1930)
• 28 USC 1498. This statute allows the US government to override patent protection (or contract another entity to do so) for public use purposes. The patent owner can sue for limited compensation. See [3]

[edit] Patent-related decisions

[edit] Supreme Court

• Hotchkiss v. Greenwood (1850)
• City of Elizabeth v. American Nicholson Pavement Co. (1878)
• Egbert v. Lippmann (1881)
• Bauer & Cie. v. O'Donnell (1913)
• Graver Tank & Manufacturing Co. v. Linde Air Products Co. (1950)
• Graham v. John Deere Co. (1966)
• Gottschalk v. Benson (1972)
• Parker v. Flook (1978)
• Diamond v. Chakrabarty (1980)
• Diamond v. Diehr (1981)
• Markman v. Westview Instruments, Inc. (1996)
• Warner-Jenkinson Company, Inc. v. Hilton Davis Chemical Co. (1997)
• Pfaff v. Wells Electronics, Inc. (1998)
• Festo Corp. v. Shoketsu Kinzoku Kogyo Kabushiki Co. (2002)
• Merck v. Integra (2005)
• eBay Inc. v. MercExchange, L.L.C. (2006)
• KSR v. Teleflex (2006)
• Microsoft Corp. v. AT&T Corp. (2007)

[edit] United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit

While the Federal Circuit sits below the Supreme Court in the hierarchy of U.S. courts, it is often thought of as the supreme court for patents. The U.S. Supreme Court rarely decides patent cases, and unless overruled by a Supreme Court case, Federal Circuit decisions can dictate the results of both patent prosecution and litigation.

• State Street Bank & Trust Company v. Signature Financial Group, Inc. (1998)
• In re Bilski (2008). Patentability of business methods.

[edit] Board of Patent Appeals and Interferences (BPAI)

• Ex Parte Bowman
• Ex Parte Lundgren

[edit] Unclassified

• Ex Parte Quayle

[edit] Other

• American Intellectual Property Law Association (AIPLA)
• Board of Patent Appeals and Interferences (BPAI)
• Confederate Patent Office
• United States Court of Customs and Patent Appeals (CCPA)
• History of United States patent law
• List of top United States patent recipients
• Manual of Patent Examining Procedure (MPEP)
• United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC)
• United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO)
• United States Patents Quarterly (USPQ)
• European patent law
• Japanese patent law
• United States copyright law
• United States trademark law

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) web site:
  • Consolidated laws (pdf, 1MB)
  • Glossary of patent terms
  • Search US patents
• US code, Title 35
• Flowchart of US Patent Examination Process
• US Patent Layout explains the layout of a US patent
• Patent Law Portal - links relating to US patent law
• Tech LawForum - patent issues from Santa Clara University School of Law

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