Filing Patents Online

The patent offices worldwide have opened their databases to the public there is no better place to start the search for patentability than with these free databases the same databases that provide additional services and literature search are packaged by other vendors. The United States Patent and Trademark Office (1) has created one of the world s largest electronic databases that includes every patent issued recently, published applications are also available in the database. Scientists are strongly urged to develop expert skills in interacting with the database of the United States Patent and Trademark Office. The search at United States Patent and Trademark Office can be most beneficial if the scientist learns how to use the patent classification system. (Tutorials are available at the United States Patent and Trademark Office website alternately, please consult Filing Patents Online A Professional Guide by Sarfaraz K. Niazi, CRC Press 2002). 

Niazi S. Filing Patents OnLine. Boca Raton, FL CRC Press, 2003. 

Derwent International Patent Family File and U.S. Patents Full Text. Derwent International Patent Family File (DIPF) [75] provides access to 20 million patents issued by 40 patent-issuing authorities, covering more than 10 million inventions as far back as 1963. The DIPF is linked to U.S. Patents Full-Text (US-PAT) [75]. US-PAT contains the full text of more than 2 million patents issued by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office since 1976. DIPF and US-PAT are available on the commercial online service Westlaw. 

The utilization of patent information is, of course, promoted by diverse patent authorities. The European Patent Office (http //www.european-patent-office.org/) provides a service called esp cenet, which is easily accessible via the Internet (http //ep.espacenet.com/). In addition, inventors might conduct online file inspections via a service called epoline, which can be reached at http //www.epoline.org/. The user gains direct access to all published European patent applications and patents stored in electronic form. Patent information services are also offered by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (http //www.uspto.gov/). 

The sharp rise in the number of papers and patent applications is evident on inspection of the citations in Chemical Abstracts. For the period from 1967, when C. A. started their online file, until 1989, a nearly exponential trend in publications is obvious (see Table I). For comparison, the ten-year period from 1957 to 1966 contains only about 80 relevant C. A. references, which is an average of eight per year. 

The USPTO website (www.uspto.gov). The USPTO website is particularly valuable for finding up-to-date fee information on most aspects related to the USPTO s dealings, including up-to-date fee information, published patents and patent applications and online file histories (through the Public PAIR option). 

Adams SR. Searching the PCT Patent Files Another Instance of Faux Full Text. Online 2002 26(2) 33-36. A discussion of problems in the content and searchability of databases containing the text of Patent Cooperation Treaty applications (WO documents). It includes the source of scanned text for the various databases and the completeness of coverage in each. 

It is perhaps then no surprising that, following the original patents dating back to 1998, tens of patent applications have been filed in the last 10 years to disclose and protect specific processes to make functional microcapsules and use thereof. Table 18.3 lists a selection of said patents. Other relevant patents exist and applications are filed on a regular basis. They can easily be accessed online using a patent database. 

Delphion, www.delphion.com/ (accessed August 9,2010). Owned by Thomson Reuters, this subscription service provides full text searching, large file export, and many data analysis tools for intemational patents. It can search a number of available international patent collections and includes the Derwent World Patents Index, one of the oldest online patent services with access to 18.25 million inventions from 41 different intemational patent issuing authorities. ... 

Web-accessible versions of traditional on-line databases like Beilstein," the IBM patent database," or interfaces to in-house databases such as the PDB files" are not discussed here. They provide a Web-centric interface but offer much the same functionality as the traditional versions and are discussed in Online Databases in Chemistry. 

The WPIM file corresponds to Derwent World Patents Index (DWPI) online file, and therefore includes documents from all of the countries that Derwent normally covers. Indexing for WPIM began in 1987, and since 1987, Derwent has double indexed all chemical patents with both the fragmentation codes and WPIM indexing. Specific structures are indexed if they are not part of a Markush structure in the same patent document. Polymers are not indexed in detail in the WPIM database. Polypeptides of 10 or more amino acids are indexed in a separate non-Markush database and are not included in WPIM. All four online services that carry the DWPI also have the WPIM accession numbers. WPIM indexes patents from all countries in the Derwent database, but it is available to subscribers only. 

The literature before 1967 is included retrospectively in the database CAOLD, which, in the meantime, contains 700,000 references to 1.4 million substances, which were mentioned before 1967, and 152.000 references to patents. For this database Chemical Abstracts Service scans bit by bit the Formula Index of the Sixth (1957-1961) and the Seventh (1962-1966) Collective Period. Therefore only substance references are contained in this database with no text information or even abstracts. However, cross-references to patents are marked with P. Using this database you have to consider that the chemical nomenclature in those days was quite different to the names in use today. Therefore an online search in CAOLD should be proceded by a search in the Registry File (Sect. 7.6) and then continued with the appropriate CAS Registry Number in CAOLD. 

Searching the US patent 5,158,840 online in the CA File (Sect. 7.3.4) no reference can be found. Chemical Abstracts Service includes the change of the patent status only in the printed version, it is not added to the databases. Therefore the CA file is not the ideal source to search for information about patent families, but rather the printed Patent Indexes. 

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. 

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. 

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