Chemical Abstracts as a Patent Database

When patent files are enumerated, the Chemical Abstracts database is often not mentioned. However, no other bibliographic and specialized database in the world shows the same thoroughness in evaluating patents for the chemical area. The big advantage provided by this database lies in the fact that patents as well as literature are contained and retrieved in a single file with a single search. 

Section 7.4 will discuss the World Patents Index file, the world s largest patent file with intellectual abstracts. The World Patents Index does not specialize in chemistry, but still it is essential for chemical online queries. In order to provide a combined search in CA and the World Patents Index, STN has introduced certain changes and innovations to its command language. 

Patents should not only be part of a query during an online examination of a possible patent application. Patent applications usually precede the coming of a product onto the market by three to five years. Derwent says that about 70-90% of all new developments are exclusively published in patent documents. Statistics showing the number of referenced patents support this. 

While in the year 1967 CAS referenced only 36,797 patent documents in the online file, in 1992 the number had risen to 98,505 (Fig. 1). In 1992 58.8% of the indexed patents were from Japan. Without the online file, this resource would probably be completely out of reach, as translations from Japanese are extremely costly. The databases provide abstracts written in English, thus presenting a basis for the decision of whether or not a translation fi-om Japanese should be commissioned. 

Refraining from searching for patent information means lagging behind in the information sector and thus in R D as well. 

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