The state of the art patent search is the broadest and most general of all the patent searches. It is essentially a market survey that should ideally include a broad brush look at everything that has been done in a given art. State of the art search results are invaluable in many situations. To a client who is contemplating entry into a particular field of art, the state of the art search results can provide concrete evidence of the advisability of such a decision. To a client who is currently active in a particular field of art, the state of the art search results can lay out the path that must be followed to design around the current art.
In most cases, a thorough state of the art search can save all types of clients a great deal of time and money. Knowing what work has previously been done, what problems have been discovered and how they have been solved, who is active in the field of art, and the chronological development of their work can prevent wasteful excursions into blind alleys and unnecessary expenditures of capital.
This paper seeks to explore all facets of the state of the art search and to provide a novice searcher with the detailed information necessary to generate that search.
When a client's needs indicate that they would benefit from a state of the art search, your first decision should be whether you, the patent attorney, should conduct the search yourself, using in house resources, or farm the search out to a professional search firm. There is no inherent reason why a state of the art search must be conducted by an attorney. The state of the art search is a market survey and generally does not involve decisions of substantive law. However, there are many factors which should enter into this decision. First of all, you must consider your skill level as a searcher. Would it be possible for you to conduct a thorough state of the art search in an economically efficient manner? Frequently, an attorney's time is too expensive to justify spending a client's money to have the attorney carry out the search himself. Of course, there are exceptions to every rule. If the patent attorney is a competent searcher with access to the necessary electronic databases, it may be economically sound for such an attorney to do the search himself.
Although it may not be economically sound for the attorney to conduct the search himself, there are usually other options available for in house searching. Generally, the time of paralegals or associates in a firm is less expensive than that of the patent attorney. Therefore, you should also consider whether it is appropriate for these individuals to conduct the search. There are many cases where this is the most appropriate course. For example, if there is a competent searcher on staff who has access to the necessary electronic databases, it may be more cost effective to do the search in house rather than farm it out to a professional search firm. However, the searcher's education and experience in a given field can greatly affect the quality of the search. Therefore, you should also consider using a professional search firm.
Farming out state of the art searches to professional search firms can have its advantages as well. Most specifically, employees of professional search firms tend to specialize in searching certain areas of technology. Therefore, these searchers tend to be more efficient and more thorough than an inexperienced searcher. Additionally, international searching can be quite difficult. International searching often requires the searcher to be fluent in a foreign language or have access to a translator. A professional search firm is more likely to have employees with these skills. Typical searches by professionals cost in the neighborhood of $100 to $200 per hour, but the total cost can vary substantially depending on the sources searched and the thoroughness required.
It is important to remember that every situation is different. Each client's needs should dictate whether the search is done in house, by the patent attorney or by other staff members, or sent outside to professional searchers. The factors that should enter into the decision are the financial status of the client, the reason for the search, and the experience level and area of expertise of the in house searchers. There is no easy answer and each situation should be examined individually before choosing the option that best suits the individual client's needs.
The scope of a state of the art search is not always easy to define. Although the state of the art search is the broadest patent search, it must also be quite narrow to be useful. While those two concepts seem to be contradictory, they are really complimentary. The scope of the state of the art search must be broad in order to give a complete picture of what is out there. The searcher must try to generate a search that includes everything that has happened in a particular field of art. The best way to be sure of including everything is to search a broad array of sources. This includes not only searching issued patents, but also searching field of art specific publications and even transcripts of important scientific meetings where technical papers may be presented before publication. Remember, the good state of the art search should provide the client with the information necessary to make fully informed decisions regarding the suitability of large investments of both time and money.
However, the scope of the search must also be quite narrow to be useful. If you define the relevant field of art as organic chemistry, for example, your search would produce so much information that it would be totally useless. Even narrowing your search to a specific class of organic compounds, such as aldehydes, would not generate a useful amount of information. The field of art that you choose to search must be very narrow. For example, the field of aldehydes could be narrowed by searching one particular aldehyde or one specific use of aldehydes. It may be necessary to continue to narrow the scope of the search until you identify the truly relevant field of art. For example, searching formaldehyde use to preserve biological specimens would narrow the search even further. Remember, the narrowest definition of the relevant field of art that completely encompasses the field of interest is the best.
Therefore, the scope of the state of the art search should be broad enough to provide a complete picture of what is out there and, at the same time, should be narrow enough to limit the information gathered to what is truly relevant.
A good state of the art search should begin at the beginning. There is no need to limit your search by a particular time period unless the field is so crowded that you need to narrow your search more than would be possible using the methods described above. Furthermore, you may find that in some fields of art, biotechnology, for example, limiting your search by time periods will be very ineffective. This is true for any rapidly developing field of art. In these cases, it is more appropriate to narrow your search by modifying the definition of the field of art itself.
Producing a state of the art search that is unlimited in time should provide your client with a chronological history of the field of art. Your client will certainly have access to the most recent developments in the field. However, it is no less important that your client also have access to earlier developments. These earlier developments may provide your client with information that will be critical to his decision making process.
Therefore, unless it is impossible to sufficiently narrow your search by other means, the state of the art search should not be limited by time period.
There are three main categories of information sources available: patents, publications, and other sources. Each of these source categories has distinct characteristics and no one category is sufficient for a good state of the art search. Rather, all categories of information sources should be considered and used for each state of the art search. What follows is a general outline of what is available within each category and how that information can be accessed.
In order to conduct a thorough state of the art search, it is necessary to search issued patents and published patent applications where possible. Although it is impossible to give your client an up to the minute report on the current state of the art, issued patents provide insight into recent developments as well as historical perspective. Since patent applications are secret in the United States until the patent issues, the state of the art searcher will not find the most recent developments in the art or emerging technologies in this portion of the search. However, most foreign patent offices do publish patent applications after 18 months. Therefore, a complete state of the art search of patents requires searching internationally as well as in the United States. There are three main access points for searching patents: (1) United States Patent & Trademark Office; (2) Patent & Trademark Depository Libraries; and, (3) Online Services, both public and private. Each of these access points will be considered separately below.
United States Patent & Trademark Office: The USPTO has a public search room where you can get access to copies of issued patents. This may be a good place to do a state of the art search if you know that there is one particular class or subclass that completely describes your field of art. Patents in the public search rooms are filed by classification. Therefore, if you know what class you want to search (you can determine the class you are interested in by using the Manual of Classification), simply go to the shoe containing that class and physically look through the patents in the shoe.
However, there are some problems with this method. First of all, the shoes are quite dirty so searching them may not be an enjoyable experience. Second, if your field of art requires that you search several classifications, the physical search may be too time consuming to be productive. Additionally, some percentage of U.S. patents have been removed from the public search room. There is no way to tell if patents are missing from the shoe(s) you are searching. Finally, unless you are in the Washington, D.C. area, this is probably not the best way to conduct a state of the art search.
Patent and Trademark Depository Library Program: The United States Patent and Trademark Office and the Department of Commerce have created a nationwide system of libraries designated to collect and make available patent and trademark information. There are currently 80 Patent and Trademark Depository Libraries (PTDL) in 49 states and Puerto Rico.
A patent search in a PTDL requires identifying the patent class and subclass by first searching the Index to Classification, an alphabetical list of key words, and then finding the class and subclass number in the Manual of Classification. It is often necessary to consult the Definition of Classes to better define what is included in a given class. Once the correct class and subclass is determined, obtain a list, from microfilm or CD-ROM, of all patent numbers granted for every class and subclass to be searched. Now, you can either narrow your patent search by using the Official Gazette - patent section to eliminate patents that are not directly relevant to your field of search or you can search the complete text and drawings of all the patents on your list. Your goal is to find a group of patents that provide your client with a broad survey of what has been patented in the relevant field of art.
There are also problems with this search method. First, your entire search depends upon your choice of classification. In some cases, it may be difficult to choose a small number of classifications to search. In that case, PTDL searching may not be an economical choice. Second, not everyone has access to a PTDL. The one in your state may be some distance away and therefore not a good choice for your state of the art search. Finally, the PTDL search is not appropriate if you want to search using criteria other than classification. If you want to search using criteria such as words you would expect to see in the title or abstract of a patent, you should search electronically.
Also, because we do have a global market and other countries publish patent applications, it is critical to include international patents in your state of the art search. Unfortunately, neither the United States Patent and Trademark Office nor the Patent and Trademark Depository Libraries allow you to search internationally. Therefore, when conducting a state of the art search for patents, the electronic search access points discussed below may be your best choice.
Online Services: There are many online services available. Several commercial vendors provide access to patent information. While these commercial services typically have very complete and up-to-date information, they are also expensive to use and require some skill to navigate. There are also patent searching resources available on the World Wide Web. There are currently no full text, free WWW searching sites available from the Patent and Trademark Office. However, there are quite a few web sites that offer searching capabilities. What follows is a brief summary of the available online services, both commercial and free access, and how they can be used to produce a good state of the art search.
Commercial Vendors: There are a number of commercial vendors that offer access to both United States and international patents and published applications. Each source has unique characteristics and no one source should be used for all situations. Again, each source should be considered when planning a state of the art search and the most appropriate source(s) for the situation should be chosen.
Lexis/Nexis: The Lexis library that allows searching of patents is Lexpat. The Lexpat library provides access to the full text of U.S. patents from 1976 as well as the following updated information: assignments, certificates of corrections, term extensions, adverse decisions, reexamination certificates, reissues, disclaimers, dedications and litigation notices. Lexpat is one of the few patent databases that provide access to full text patents. When you have entered Lexpat, you have a number of choices. You may search full text utility patents only or you can search both full text utility and design patents. The information on design patents is rather skimpy, since the main issue is the graphic content, which is missing.
You may search by patent number, inventor name, assignee name, classification, key words, or any combination of the above. The search language necessary to access these search fields is the same as that required by any other Lexis library. Lexpat covers chemistry and all technologies as well as design and plant patents. Legal status and cited reference searching is also available. Additionally, Lexis/Nexis provides access to the Manual of Classification and the Index to the Manual of Classification and to patent law periodicals and prior art search files including some technological journals.
Lexis/Nexis is a big name in legal research who also has a full text patent library. The main weakness of this patent library is the lack of international databases and patent family information. If you are comfortable using Lexis and can navigate through the Lexis system, it can be a useful source for a state of the art searcher. However, other commercial databases give more searching flexibility.
Lexis/Nexis is a commercial vendor and there are charges for all searches you run. For additional information, contact your Lexis/Nexis representative.
Westlaw: Westlaw provides access to several patent databases through the Dialog on Westlaw gateway. The databases available are essentially Dialog databases and will be discussed under that vendor.
Questel-Orbit: Questel-Orbit is an commercial vendor that specializes in intellectual property information. Questel-Orbit supplies direct access to the most comprehensive collection of patent databases accessible online. Questel-Orbit provides access to international, U.S., and foreign national subject oriented databases as well as international and U.S. legal oriented databases. Questel-Orbit also allows access to commercial databases such as Derwent Information. Questel- Orbit has approximately 40 patent databases and supports single as well as multi- file searching of up to 8 databases at one time.
Questel-Orbit also supports multi-file literature duplicate detection and grouping and degrouping features to allow users to refine their searches. Additionally, Questel-Orbit has a PowerIndex which allows users to use one of sixteen pre-defined file clusters or create their own groups of up to 40 databases. PowerIndex may be searched using full boolean and proximity searches and automatically ranks database lists. Files can be searched by patent number, inventor name, assignee name, abstract, classification, key words, or any combination of the above.
Questel-Orbit has a very flexible search system that can be adapted to almost any type of patent searching. A state of the art searcher can get a great deal of valuable information from using this system. More information about Questel-Orbit is available by calling Questel-Orbit customer service at 1-800-456- 7248.
Dialog: Dialog is a commercial vendor that offers approximately 14 patent databases. These databases are searchable by patent number, inventor name, assignee name, abstract, classification, key works, or any combination of the above. Dialog is in the middle of an ongoing project to enhance its full text U.S. patent file with information from the IFI/CLAIMS files. The first additions included enhanced patent titles, standardized company and inventor names and IFI company codes and legal status information on patent reexaminations, reassignments, lapses for non-payment of maintenance fees, reinstatements and extensions. Dialog has also added a European patent file covering 1978 to the present with English language abstract. Although Dialog has fewer patent specific databases than Questel-Orbit, it does provide access to many other useful publication databases.
Dialog contains databases that include international patents, US patents, European patents and family and legal status information. These databases are searched using standard boolean searching techniques.
Dialog does support state of the art searching and whether you use their service or another commercial service really depends on personal choice. Each commercial vendor has advantages and disadvantages and your goal as a patent searcher is it identify the search strategy and vendor that best suits your client's needs. Additional information about Dialog is available from their customer service representatives at 1-800-334-2564.
Electronic Data Systems Shadow Patent Office: The Shadow Patent Office is a commercial vendor that offers subject searches, infringement searches, classification searches, full text patent retrieval, and forward/backward citation searches. There are no sign-up or monthly fees for this service. However, customers are charged for the services they order. This service allows the user to search based upon subject matter, similarity to existing patents, issue date range, patent number, class or subclass. Searches result in reports which list: (a) The top three (3) patent classes found in the search and their frequency; (b) Patent number for each patent in the report; (c) Issue date for each patent in the report; (d) Class and subclass for each patent in the report; and (e) Title for each patent in the report. This site also includes a Classification Analysis feature that will tell you which classes or subclasses are most likely to contain patents similar to the invention described by your search strategy.
This database includes 1.7 million U.S. patents issued since January, 1972 and is updated on a weekly basis. This site provides a complete search approach that can optimize the searcher's chances of finding all relevant art in the field of interest. The Classification Analysis feature makes this site particularly useful for an initial state of the art inquiry because it can identify most of the relevant classes or subclasses for additional searches. However, you should keep in mind that this site only provides patents issued since 1972. It may be necessary therefore to search elsewhere to target earlier patents. Keep in mind that a state of the art searcher is not concerned with validity or current status of patents but rather with determining what inventions are included in the state of the art.
Internet Town Hall Patent Database (IBM Patent Server): This site is now sponsored by IBM Corp and can be found at http://patent.womplex.ibm.com. This site allows access to over 26 years of U.S. patent descriptions as well as the last 17 years of images. The first entries date back to January 5, 1971. There are some problems with the information in this database. However, IBM maintains a link that tells you which time periods are known to be missing or contain incomplete patents or images. The incomplete patents may be missing some data fields.
This site provides access to the bibliographic data and text of all claims of numerous patents issued from 1974 to the present, plus some patents issued during the period of 1971 through 1973. This site supports simple keyword, phrase, and patent number searches as well as boolean operators. You can search the following fields from this site: patent number, title, abstract, all claims, assignee, inventors, and attorney/agent. You can also search patents cited by the examiners as well as full text of U.S. patent specifications. The complete scanned image of a patent can be displayed.
The patent references are hyperlinked to allow users to locate and view art references by navigating through the cited patents. The link is bi-directional so users can access not only the patents referenced by the examiners, but also later patents that reference the existing document.
In addition, this site includes information of the USPTO maintenance fee status of all patents. This provides users with the renewal status of patents which can be very helpful to a client attempting to make capital investment decisions or planning research and development projects.
This database is in English and is updated weekly. However, it is not a comprehensive database since it only goes back to 1971 and there are missing and/or incomplete patents. It does provide comprehensive access to the full text of patents (issued after 1971) and images (for patents issued after 1980). This site is also one of the most reasonably priced available and you can order a complete copy of any interesting patents through Optipat, Inc. Optipat also provides other services through this site including family searches, foreign patents, etc.
This site can provide a state of the art searcher with a good search for relatively new fields of art. The reference searching capability is particularly useful to the state of the art searcher. This capability allows the searcher to see patents that they would not otherwise have found. While this site does have some obvious weaknesses, a good state of the art searcher can recognize these and still exploit the positive aspects of this site.
MicroPat Online: MicroPatent is a commercial vendor that provides a patent search and delivery service. MicroPatent's information specialists will search your request through their patent databases which include United States Patent Office (U.S. granted patents 1975-present), European Patent Office (patent applications back to 1978 as published by the EPO), World Intellectual Property Organization (patent applications back to 1978 as published by WIPO), and the Japanese Patent Office (patent applications back to 1995 as published by JAPIO). These databases can be searched by any combination of approximately 20 different bibliographical fields including title, abstract, assignee, inventor, US and IPC classification numbers, priority data, application numbers, dates, inventor location, etc., or by key words that appear in abstracts or titles.
After MicroPatent completes the searches that you request, they have several methods of providing you with the relevant patents. Patents can be e- mailed, downloaded, faxed, or mailed.
This is not a full text site. All searching is done by bibliographic fields. Although this can be a good site when you know what you are looking for, it is not particularly well suited to state of the art searching. However, if your field of art can be limited to a particular class, this site may provide some useful information. All in all, Micropatent would be a less than ideal source for a good state of the art search.
PatScan: PatScan is a commercial patent searching service based at the University of British Columbia. Searches are performed using patent data in CD-ROM, microfilm, and print covering Canadian, U.S. and European patents. Currently this site is under construction and access to material is limited. There is currently no ability to do on-line searching.
Qpat.US: This is a combination commercial vendor/free web site sponsored by Questel-Orbit. You can find Qpat.US at http://www.qpat.com. This site contains the full text of all U.S. patents issued since January 1, 1974. But, these full text records are only available to paying subscribers. This site offers a point and click interface. Qpat offers many searching choices from free text natural language searches to complex boolean search statements. Additional features include search term stemming and a fuzzy logic advisor to help searchers create more precise and useful queries. The searcher can combine sets, download sections of multiple patents and save search strategies.
This site appears to be a new breed of internet searchable patent databases. The flexible nature of this site allows searchers to accomplish virtually any kind of patent search. At this time, however, this site only includes U.S. patents. Therefore, the state of the art searcher will need to use additional resources to search internationally.
Source Translation and Optimization: STO is a commercial vendor that offers patent search and technology analysis in the following areas: software, hardware, telecommunications, electronics and medical devices. They can be accessed through the WWW at http://sunsite.unc.edu. STO offers U.S. patent prior art searches, literature searches, foreign patent searches and infringement defense searches.
This site allows the searcher to locate patent class using either the PTO Manual of Classification or the Index to Classification and then to retrieve patent titles using class/subclass code. You can also retrieve patent abstracts using patent numbers.
This is a very specialized private database. If your particular field of art is covered by this database, it may be a good source of information. However, keep in mind that it is a private database and therefore, may not include relevant art. Furthermore, the search capabilities of this site are not in line with those required for a state of the art search. More information about STO services is available from their web site.
European Patent Register: This is a commercial site that can be found at http://www.epo.co.at/epo/epidos. The Register of European Patents provides detailed information on all European and Euro-PCT patent applications. The system provides bibliographic data such as title of the invention, classification, publication dates, name and address of the applicant, inventor, attorney and the latest information about the status of the granting procedure of the patent application. The Register is provided in English, French and German and is updated daily. The database is limited to information on all published European patent applications and PCT applications with designation of EPC Member States from first publication until grant.
This site can be searched using European application or publication number, PCT application or publication number, applicant's name, international patent classification, or priority number. The search capability that is most relevant to the state of the art searcher is the international patent classification. Since European and PCT applications are published after 18 months, this is a good site for up to date information on the state of the art in a particular international class. Once you have identified art references that may be of interest, this site can also provide current information on the legal status of those references.
Community of Science U.S. Patent Citation Database: This site is a fully searchable bibliographic file containing all of the approximately 1.7 million U.S. patents issued since 1975. The site is located at http://muscat.gdb.org. The Patent Citation database is updated weekly and permits subscribers to search (using standard boolean query mechanisms) all of the important front page information about each patent: number, dates, assignee, inventor, title, abstract, exemplary claims for recent years, and U.S. and international classifications. In addition, the database tracks how each patent cites previous patents or is cited by subsequent ones.
This database is also searchable through a unique approach to the U.S. Patent Manual of Classification, which permits searchers to identify specific areas of interest through a meta-database query and to navigate across the hierarchy classification using browse and search combinations that quickly "home in" on sought after information.
This database is available to subscribers only. This classification search capability described above is useful for state of the art searcher who are still attempting to narrow their field of search. The disadvantage of this site is that it only contains bibliographic data. This is another example of a site that should be exploited for its advantages and supplemented in areas of weakness.
Free Access Sites: There are many WWW sites that provide free access to some form of United States and foreign patents. It is difficult to provide a current listing of these sites because new sites are being added all the time. However, the new sites are not difficult to find if you need them. A simple web search using any of the available search engines will generate a fairly complete listing. What follows is a summary of some of the available free access sites and what they offer to the state of the art searcher.
The AIDS Patent Project: This site is sponsored by CNIDR, USPTO, and the National Science Foundation and can be found at http://patents.cnidr.org/pto. In addition to searching capabilities this site provides links to various access points for AIDS patents and related databases. This site supports browsing, free-text and boolean searching of the AIDS Patent Database and also allows a user to search the US Patent Classifications Database.
The AIDS Patents Browse Page lists all of the patents in the AIDS collection and lets you look through each of them without searching. This page lists patents in ascending patent number order with the patent title and allows a user to look through the abstract, front page, full patent, images and similar patents.
Full text and boolean searches allow you to search full text or to limit your search to the following fields: title, abstract, patent number, issue date, application number, application date, international class, inventor name or assignee. Additional fields are available in the U.S. database.
This database is in English and includes over 2000 research oriented patents relating to AIDS. If the field of art you are searching is AIDS related, this is an excellent source for searching issued patents. Both the browsing function and the searching function can be included in a state of the art search plan. However, since the database does not include all issued patents, it is possible that some patents of interest may be excluded. Therefore, your search should always be extended to include other patent databases.
Biotechnology Patents: This site is sponsored by Biotechnology Information Center; National Agricultural Library/USDA, National Science Foundation, Sun Microsystems, WAIS, Inc., and the USPTO and can be found at http://www.inform.umd.edu/EdRes/Topic/AgrEnv/Biotech/BiotechPatents. This database is a compilation of all biotechnology patents granted in 1994 and 1995 in alphabetical order by title. This site also includes links to the PTO Information Office and to the Biotechnology Patent Classifications for the PTO manual. Patents are shown in full text form without images and there is no way to search full text without linking to the PTO Information Office which in turn refers users to WAIS source files.
This database is in English and provides a free source for biotech patents issued in 1994 or 1995. The lack of a direct search capability and the failure to include patent numbers with the title makes this site of little use to the state of the art searcher.
Electronic Data Systems Shadow Patent Office: This is a commercial vendor that provides some free services on its home page located at http://www.spo.eds.com. This site allows you to browse through the last 52 weeks of patent titles and numbers organized by week issued, and listed by U.S. class. This site is updated weekly.
Additionally, this site displays all current U.S. classes along with their descriptions and a complete subclass hierarchy. This site does actually support free subject searching. However, the database is limited to patents issued between January 1, 1995 and the last available issue date. Consequently, the results of this search will be of minimal value.
For the state of the art searcher who is not a subscriber to the Shadow Patent Office's commercial services, this site is of essentially no value.
Sunsite's Patent Search: This site is hosted by Source Translation and Optimization, a commercial service. This site can be found at http://sunsite.unc.edu. This site allows limited free searching by classification number and will return a list of titles and patent numbers. You can also retrieve abstracts if you know the patent number. This site is of little use to the state of the art searcher.
MicroPatent: This site is hosted by MicroPatent, a commercial service, and can be found at http://www.micropat.com. This site supports free full-text searching of recent patents and front page viewing for patents back to 1974. All other searching and downloading of online patents is available as a commercial service. There is little of value here for the state of the art searcher.
Chemical Patents Plus: This site supports free searching of full text U.S. patent documents from 1971, with complete patent page images from 1993. This site also includes many 3D chemical structures. Chemical Patents Plus can be found at http://casweb.cas.org/chempatplus. This site provides free searching and all patent titles and abstracts can be displayed for free. However, all other information, such as patent numbers, claims, etc. is offered for a price.
This is one of the few sites that offers 3D chemical structures. Although the drawbacks of this site include the lack of international coverage and the lack of pre- 1971 patent information, a state of the art searcher in a chemical field of art should be able to find some useful information here.
Qpat-US: This site is hosted by Questel-Orbit and can be found at http://www.Qpat.com. Questel-Orbit is a commercial vendor that supports Qpat which offers fee based services. Additionally, this site allows the user to search the abstracts and bibliographic information of all U.S. patents issued since 1974. This search capability is accessible at no cost to individuals who register with Qpat-US.
Fullerene Patent Database: This site is a comprehensive Internet archive of patents related to buckyballs, nanotubes, and other fullerenes sponsored by CNIDR, USPTO, and MIT. The Fullerene Patent Database is located at http://mgm.mit.edu:8080/pevzner/Bucky/Patents. This site includes only U.S. patents listed chronologically. Just click on the patent number to display the abstract. You can also click on the title to display the full text of some patents. The Fullerene Patent Database is not currently searchable but there are plans to make it searchable in the near future. There are also plans to add foreign fullerenes.
This is a very limited database. Only searchers working within the field of specialized carbon structures would get anything of value from this database. There is no documentation provided on line regarding frequency of updates or other administrative matters. There is really not much of value here for the state of the art searcher.
U. S. Patent and Trademark Office: This site is sponsored by CNIDR, USPTO and MCNC and can be found at http://www@pioneer.uspto.gov. This is a free abstract searching service site which provides access to abstracts for patents in the U.S. Bibliographic Database (from 1976 to the present). There are several search pages available. The Patent Boolean Search Page provides an interface for two- term boolean searching of the U.S. Patent Database. The Patent Advanced Search Page provides an interface for advanced searching of the U.S. Patent Database. You can search here by patent number, inventor name, patent abstract, inventor city, references, inventor state, etc. A patent number search page allows you to search by patent number. There is also a page that allow you to search by U.S. Patent Classification.
This site does however charge for copies of patents which can be picked up at the public service window, mailed by regular mail or Federal Express, or faxed. Although this site does not provide a full text search option, it can be very useful in a state of the art search. Keep in mind that when you limit your search to abstracts rather than full text, you have narrowed your search in a way that may result in missing some relevant art.
There are two main reasons for doing a state of the art search. The first is to provide an historical perspective on a small field of art. This can best be accomplished by searching the available sources for issued patents. The second main reason for conducting a state of the art search is to provide the client with the most up to date understanding possible of the relevant field of art. While issued patents can be a very good source of current information, publications are frequently a better source of very up to date information.
It can take several years to get a patent granted. Even the best state of the art search of granted patents will not provide a clear picture of very recent developments or emerging technologies. Publications, on the other hand, are an excellent source of the most recent information. There are several ways to get access to the publications of a particular field of art. What follows is a summary of the best sources for that information.
The Inventor's Library: The inventor's library is one of the most often overlooked sources for state of the art publications. The inventor knows what publications are relevant to their particular field of art. Furthermore, they probably subscribe to those very publications. A good place to begin a publication search is in the inventor's/client's office.
Public Library: A public or university library is also a good source of publication information. Most libraries have extensive collections of scientific or technological journals. Additionally, it is a good idea to search newspaper and magazine collections for relevant information. However, manual searching of newspaper or magazine collections is rarely productive, and should probably be done electronically. Many libraries also have access to commercial databases that house even more extensive collections. All libraries offer trained personnel who can help you take full advantage of their searching capabilities.
Electronic Searching: There are many ways to search publications electronically. Commercial vendors have a significant presence in this market. Additionally, there are several free access points through the World Wide Web. The following is a summary of the available access points and what they have to offer the state of the art searcher.
Dialog: Dialog is a commercial on line information database vendor that provides a wide variety of database files. There are general company and business files as well as specialized field of art and technical databases. Dialog also provides access to newspapers and magazines. All files are searchable. State of the art searchers will find this is a very efficient way to access a large body of information.
Lexis/Nexis: In addition to their extensive collection of legal databases, Lexis/Nexis also provides access to other types of databases. They have business, finance and news databases that provide a good source for non-patent publications and company information. They also provide access to specialized industry journals and newspapers. It is also possible to get access to many foreign language papers and magazines. All of the libraries in the Lexis/Nexis system are searchable using the normal Lexis/Nexis techniques. Although there are other online services that provide access to more non-legal sources, Lexis/Nexis can be useful to the state of the art searcher.
STN International: The Science and Technical Information Network offers a fee based online search service that provides accurate, up-to-date, specific information from over 200 scientific, technical, business, and patent databases. STN also offers a fee based WWW access to selected databases via the STN EASY service. STN is operated jointly by CAS in North America, by JST (Japan Science and Technology Corporation) in Asia, and by FIZ-Karlsruhe in Germany. Information is offered on a broad range of scientific fields, including (but not limited to) engineering, materials science, physics, biotechnology, regulatory compliance, pharmacology, and chemistry.
STN offers features that include advanced chemical structure searching, easy cross-searching of complementary databases and chemical reaction information. This database would be very valuable to a state of the art searcher interested in a very technical field.
National Science Foundation: The National Science Foundation has a web page located at http://wwwnsf.gov. There are several search options available through this site. The user can search related web site, NSF publications and the NSF grants and awards database.
The information valuable to the state of the art searcher is the NSF grants and awards database. This database allow searching of NSF award abstracts. This should provide the searcher with a truly state of the art picture of what is currently happening in a particular field by allowing the searcher to examine the abstracts of research projects that have been recently funded by the National Science Foundation. Even though not every research project is funded by NSF, this is a good source for very current information.
In addition to the inventor's library, the corporate library can also be a good source of information for a state of the art search. If the client is currently involved in the specific field of art, they will have a great deal of information at their offices. It is always a good idea to talk to your client. Besides access to valuable information, the client can really help to define your search. The client knows exactly what field of art he is interested in. You should always take advantage of their "inside" position.
Furthermore, the client may have access to important technical papers that were presented at scientific meetings but that have not yet been published. He may have an advance copy of a paper to be published or he may have simply heard a presentation involving the field of art of interest. Do not overlook this source. It may be that a patent application has already been filed on the invention but will not be public for some time. Therefore, your client may be your only source for this material.
As with any other patent search, it is always necessary to balance thoroughness against time and money considerations. It is virtually impossible to get a true, up to the minute, state of the art search. You should therefore concentrate on getting your client as complete and accurate search result as possible within the time and money constraints dictated by your client's individual situation. Each of the above sources can help you accomplish that goal. Your goal as the state of the art searcher should be to formulate the most effective search possible by choosing the sources that best suit you client's needs.
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