|
Patent FAQs
What is a patent?
Why is the university interested in patents?
Who is an inventor?
What is an invention?
What are the criteria for a patent?
Can you publish while applying for a patent?
What about sponsors?
Why is record keeping important?
What is a patent?
A patent is a 20-year monopoly that allows the patent owner to prevent
others from making, using, or selling the patented invention without permission.
In return for the monopoly, the inventor must make known the details of
the invention so that others can seek improvements or new uses. The inventor
gains by exclusive access to the invention, and society gains by using
the detailed description of the invention to further advance technology.
Back to top
Why is the university interested in
patents?
The university, as owner of inventions made by its faculty, students, and
staff, can license patents to companies that know how to turn the invention
into commercial products or services. (See Policies.) Ideally, developing
a "raw" invention into products and services desired by the
public creates jobs, increases government tax revenues, and provides additional
revenue to the inventor and university through patent licensing fees.
Back to top
Who is an inventor?
An inventor is the one who first conceives of an invention, in detail,
and with enough specificity that one skilled in the field could construct
and practice the invention. Those who translate the concept into practice
are not considered co-inventors unless they add to the original concept
of the invention. With the agreement of the inventor(s), however, they
may share in financial benefits of the invention.
Back to top
What is an invention?
Inventions include new processes, products, apparatus, compositions of
matter, living organisms, and/or improvements to existing technology in
those categories. Abstract ideas, principles, and phenomena of nature
cannot be patented.
- Process: A method of producing a useful result; it can be an improvement
on existing systems, a combination of old systems in a novel manner,
or a new use of a known process.
- Machine: An apparatus from a simple device to a complicated combination
of many parts that performs a function and produces a definite result or effect.
- Manufactured product: An article that is produced and has a usefulness.
- Compositions of matter: Chemical compounds, and mixtures such as drugs and, more recently, living matter.
Back to top
What are the criteria for a patent?
In the United States, patentability is determined by novelty, utility,
and nonobviousness.
- Novelty: An invention is "novel" if nothing identical
previously existed. How does your invention differ from what already
exists? In what ways might it not be unique?
- Utility: An invention is useful if it produces an effect, if
the effect is the one claimed, and if the effect is desirable to society,
at least in principle. Who might find your invention useful, and why?
What companies might be interested in making or selling it, and why?
Is there other technology that currently provides similar utility? If
so, what is the unique advantage of your invention?
- Nonobviousness: Nonobviousness measures the degree to which
an invention differs from the totality of previous knowledge, and the
degree to which an invention could not have been anticipated from that
knowledge. At the time it was conceived, why might your invention not
have been obvious to people reasonably skilled in the field? Are there
ways in which it might be an evolutionary step? What is the difference
between the proposed invention and what has previously existed?
Back to top
Can I publish while applying for a patent?
Publishing and applying for patent protection are not mutually exclusive:
they can be done simultaneously under the proper circumstances. U.S. patent
laws allow one to apply for a patent no later than one year after a public
disclosure, such as a published paper, a widely available abstract, or
an offer of public sale. However, the moment a public disclosure or publication
is made, rights to foreign patents are lost unless a U.S. filing has been
made within the preceding 12 months. Foreign protection is important to
many international licensees, so inventors are urged to use discretion,
take advantage of Confidential Disclosure Agreements available from TTO,
and file invention disclosures with the university well in advance of
presentations or publications.
Back to top
What about sponsors?
Sponsoring agencies sometimes require the university to disclose inventions
that arise from work they fund. If the research that led to your invention
was sponsored, give details and a reference to the contract or grant agreement in the Invention Disclosure Form.
Back to top
Why is record keeping important?
The United States grants patents to those first to conceptualize an invention
and diligently reduce it to practice. The date the full conception of
the invention occurred, the date the idea was put into practice, and diligence
in translating concept to practice are key items to document. Inventors
can document their research process from conception to reduction to practice
by keeping journals written in ink in bound notebooks, each page dated
and signed, with witnessed signatures. Notebook witnesses must be able
to testify that they understood what the invention was and how it operated
and that what you wrote in your journal was actually witnessed on the
date entered. If additional materials are pasted in, a written reference
should be made to them at the time of entry.
Back to top |
Faculty/Staff/Student Investigators
