Читать книгу Intellectual Property Law for Engineers, Scientists, and Entrepreneurs - Howard B. Rockman - Страница 132

The searches conducted up to a few years ago were conducted by the searcher manually leafing through the collections of paper patents in the public search facilities of the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office. However, most, if not all, search associates today use a computer database in conducting their searches.

The website of the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office (www.uspto.gov) provides one with the ability to search all patents issued in the United States since the year 1976 using key word search techniques. Patents issued between 1790 and 1975 are available in image format only if you know the patent number. Thus, today both manual and computer database searching are combined to conduct a complete search of issued patents and published patent applications. Assuming that the inventor and patent attorney have provided the searcher with the identity of the inventor’s largest competitors in the area of technology covered by the search, the searcher can also use the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office database to obtain a list of all patents and the titles of these patents owned by each competitor subsequent to 1976. This will enable the searcher to pinpoint particular patents, and furnish the patent attorney and the inventor with a precise list of relevant patents owned by such competitors. The same key word techniques are used to conduct an Internet literature search.

The U.S. Patent & Trademark Office database allows searching by subject matter back to 1976, through the incorporation of key words into the search. Thus, if you are looking at a combination of electrical heating elements particularly useful for heating engine blocks, by typing the key words “heater” and “engine block” into the computer search engine, you will obtain the numbers of referenced patents issued since 1976 that correspond to that key word search. The same applies to searching published patent applications. Thus, it is important to provide your patent attorney with as much information as possible regarding the terms used in defining the technology to be searched so that these terms may be keyed into the database search.