United States patent law

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Patent law
History of patent law Economics and patents Patent prosecution Patent application Patentability Patent infringement Licensing European patent law Japanese patent law United States patent law List of patent legal concepts

The United States patent law is a first-to-invent patent legal framework. By contrast, all other national patent laws are first-to-file systems. Only the Philippines has also had a first-to-invent patent system, but converted it into a first-to-file system in 1998. The provisions of the law are laid out in title 35 of the United States Code (U.S.C.).

In the U.S., a patent is a right to exclude others from making, using, selling, offering for sale, exporting, 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 commerical 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.

See also

Concepts

• Assignor estoppel
• Continuing patent application
• Design patent
• First-sale doctrine
• Inequitable conduct
• Information disclosure statement (IDS)
• Interference proceeding
• Non-obviousness
• Non-provisional patent application
• Novelty
• On-sale bar
• Petition to make special
• Prosecution history estoppel
• Provisional application
• Reduction to practice
• Reexamination
• Reissue application
• Small entity status
• Software patents under United States patent law
• Statutory Invention Registration
• Submarine patent
• Term of patent in the United States
• Utility
• X-Patent

Legislation

• First Patent Act - April 7 1790
• American Inventors Protection Act (AIPA)
• Bayh-Dole Act
• Invention Secrecy Act (1951)
• Patent Reform Act of 2005
• Plant Patent Act (1930)

Patent-related decisions

Supreme Court

• Bauer & Cie. v. O'Donnell (1913)
• Diamond v. Chakrabarty (1980)
• EBay Inc. v. MercExchange, L.L.C. (2006)
• Festo Corp. v. Shoketsu Kinzoku Kogyo Kabushiki Co. (2002)
• Graver Tank & Manufacturing Co. v. Linde Air Products Co. (1950)
• Markman v. Westview Instruments, Inc. (1996)
• Merck v. Integra (2005)
• Parker v. Flook (1963)
• Pfaff v. Wells Electronics, Inc. (1998)
• Warner-Jenkinson Company, Inc. v. Hilton Davis Chemical Co. (1997)

United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit

• State Street Bank & Trust Company v. Signature Financial Group, Inc. (1998)

Board of Patent Appeals and Interferences (BPAI)

• Ex Parte Bowman
• Ex Parte Lundgren

Unclassified

• Ex Parte Quayle

Other

• American Intellectual Property Law Association (AIPLA)
• Board of Patent Appeals and Interferences (BPAI)
• Confederate Patent Office
• List of top United States patent recipients
• Manual of Patent Examining Procedure (MPEP)
• United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit
• 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

External links

• [US code, Title 35]

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