Patent Law

The U.S. Patent & Trademark Office (USPTO) explains the differences between Patents, Trademarks and Copyright in this manner:

A PATENT is a limited duration property right relating to an invention, granted by the Government ... to an inventor to “... exclude others from making, using, offering for sale, or selling the invention throughout the United States or importing the invention into the United States...” in exchange for public disclosure of the invention.

A TRADEMARK is a word, phrase, symbol, and/or design that identifies and distinguishes the source of the goods of one party from those of others.  A SERVICE MARK is a word, phrase, symbol, and/or design that identifies and distinguishes the source of a service rather than goods. The term “trademark” is often used to refer to both trademarks and service marks.

A COPYRIGHT protects works of authorship, such as writings, music, and works of art that have been tangibly expressed.

From USPTO Trademarks.

Three types of patents are authorized by the 1952 Patent Act:

UTILITY PATENTS are issued pursuant to 35 U.S.C. § 101 and §§ 151-153 to someone who, "...invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, article of manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof...". 

Patents for business methods and manufacturing processes are sometimes referred to as 'method' or 'process patents'. The patents encompassed by those terms, as well as 'software' patents, come under the "utility" authority.

Utility patents make up the bulk of patents granted by the USPTO. Patents issued after 1995 have a twenty year term.

DESIGN PATENTS, set out in 35 U.S.C. § 171, which protect "...any new and ornamental design for an article of manufacture". A design patent has a fourteen year term.

PLANT PATENTS are granted under 35 U.S.C. § 161, for new plant varieties which were asexually reproduced.

A different type of protection for plant variety breeders became available when the Patent and Plant Variety Protection Remedy Clarification Act, 7 U.S.C. § 2321, was enacted in 1970 and amended in 1992. The act authorized the awarding of a Plant Variety Certificate of Protection. The certificate provides a 20 to 25 year period of protection to a horticulturist that develops a new variety of sexually reproduced crop or plant.

Prior to March 2013 inventors could file a Statutory Invention Registration (SIR) with the USPTO. Its publication prevented others from patenting the invention. The SIR was most often used by inventors wishing to place the invention in the public domain, since the inventor gave up any IP rights, and no one else could patent the invention. The SIR is no longer available. The enabling provisions allowing for the SIR were repealed by §3(e) of the America Invents Act, Pub. L. 112-29, 125 Stat. 284.

Until the passage of the America Invents Act (AIA)125 Stat. 284; Pub. L. 112-29;
Leahy-Smith America Invents Act,
"...An Act...To amend title 35, United States Code, to provide for patent reform. [-- Sept. 16, 2011 - H.R. 1249 --]..." in 2011, the inventor who first came up with an idea was the person entitled to patent protection. With the passage of the AIA the first inventor to file for a patent has priority for the patent.

Someone who disputes the claim has only one year to bring an action proving that the patent grantee derived the invention from the inventor disputing the claim.

The AIA also made significant changes to use of prior art, post-grant review proceedings, infringement litigation and other areas. The Act provisions have been codified in Title 35. The original provisions of the Act as enacted can be found at FDSys, Pub. L. 112-29.

You can search the library catalog for journals or books with "patent" or a related word in the title. A better search strategy may be filtering for a subject heading. Patent related materials are catalogued under quite a few subject headings. The most common are:

You can use the links above to see all the books at the Florida state universities catalogued with the various subject headings. Change the search parameters if you wish.

Remember that once you find a good book on any subject in the catalog, you can click on the Subject Headings for all other material catalogued under the same subject area. If too many results are returned, refine your search or apply one or more of the filters on the left column of the page.

Remember, too, that you can limit results returned strictly to national materials by adding 'United States' to the subject heading.

Boston University School of Law - Patent and Trademark Searching guide.

The guide provides patent related search procedure walk-throughs, plus information not covered in this guide. It is well worth viewing.

University of Texas Engineering Library's - Finding Patents and Trademarks guide.

Another very useful guide, especially for explanations on statistics and patent searching.