research paper vs patent

Should Researchers Publish or Patent First?

It’s D-day! Finally, years and years of hard work have paid off – the invention you were working on is a success! You are extremely eager to unwrap and reveal your “creation” to the world. You gear up to write that cutting-edge paper and publish it in a top-notch journal. But wait! Are you ruining your chances of winning a patent by publishing it first? Are you jeopardizing your prospects of monetizing the invention arising from your cutting-edge research?

The “Publish or Perish” Culture

In scientific disciplines, there is a notable emphasis on “first to publish”. Scientists have a strong tendency to reveal inventions and publish findings at the earliest. It stems from the academic ideology “publish or perish” that researchers thoroughly believe in! Furthermore, a researcher may attempt to publish first rather than patent an innovation for several reasons .

• Researchers, especially academics are under pressure to increase their publication count in order to establish their expertise in their respective fields.
• Early career or young researchers with limited exposure to the potential worth of a patent may be unaware of the significance of keeping their key research findings confidential.
• The economic costs involved in applying for a patent may exceed the rewards of doing so. This especially stands true for small innovations.

Why is Patent Protection so Crucial?

As a scientist, your most valuable asset is your research idea! Without a patent, anyone can copy your invention with complete liberty. Filing a patent gives you the exclusive right to “stop” others from exploiting your patent for their own gains. In exchange for this monopoly, the patent owner must disclose technical information related to the patent.

Patenting your research findings helps you to benefit commercially from the invention  and have gratifying financial returns. Therefore, researchers must delay their publications at least until a patent application is filed.

Several countries may bar you from patenting your invention the moment you make a public disclosure. Notable exceptions include countries such as the United States, Australia, South Korea, and Japan. These countries provide a “grace period”  whereby an applicant can file a patent application within a stipulated time (6 or 12 months in most cases) after publicizing the invention and, then the previous disclosure would then be disregarded as “prior art”. For instance, after filing a US patent application, inventors enjoy a grace period of one year post the public disclosure of the invention. However, counting on that grace period is still not a good option. Once the invention becomes public, competitors may find ways to improve the invention and file a patent based on those improvements! Therefore, scientists must ensure they file a patent application first and then publish it in an academic journal.

What Constitutes a Public Disclosure?

A public disclosure does not necessarily mean a scientific presentation at a conference or an official demonstration at a tradeshow. It could also be by way of a conference abstract, a letter to the editor, a journal article, via emails, public forums, or a poster. Once something is made public (discussed, presented, or published) it is considered state of the art and is no longer novel. Therefore, it cannot be protected or patented.

How do I Publish Patent Related Content?

Before discussing your findings with anyone, remember to discuss with your supervisor if the research has the ability to result in intellectual property. If you decide to publish a paper associated with your patent, it is advisable to inform the same to the journal editor as a pre-submission query. The journal editor may inform you about any rules related to the publication of patent-related content. Furthermore, get your scientific paper reviewed by the IP office or a patent counselor before submitting it to a journal.

The Golden Route to Balance Patents and Publications

To succeed in the scientific arena, it is crucial for a researcher to continue presenting at conferences, publish papers, and win grants. So how do you achieve the best of both worlds?

• Take advice from your institution’s technology transfer department and Intellectual Property (IP) offices to develop strategies for ensuring patent protection. All this while you amaze the scientific community with your knowledge and acumen.
• File a patent before you speak about, present, or publish your work in the public domain.
• Be cautious while presenting your work or writing an abstract. Refrain from divulging too many details that can actually enable a third party to copy your invention.
• Broadly outline your work, without spelling out each and every aspect, while discussing with potential organizations or companies.
• If you intend to have business discussions with a third party (potential investors/buyers), ensure that a confidentiality agreement is in place prior to the discussions.
• Use codes to describe your data, elements, or any principal components.
• Take assistance from legal experts about how to best present your work.
• Make general statements regarding your work instead of being explicit and precise about your findings.

For a win-win situation, all you need is a little planning, self-discipline, forethought, and vigilance.

Have you ever tried publishing information related to a patent? How was your experience? Do let us know in the comments section below!

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KEY DIFFERENCE BETWEEN A RESEARCH PAPER AND A PATENT

Scientists, physicians, architects, and researchers who write for science or technological publications are generally taught the importance and technique of writing and publishing articles early on, but patent applications involving those same professions as inventors are frequently less clearly explained and maybe a mystery.

RESEARCH PAPER

A research paper is an academic paper that explain a scientific idea with analysis, interpretation and argument. Hence, a research idea created by a university team can be represented in the research paper and the implementation essentially in the same manner. When a researcher conducts experiments and documents the results (inferences) from such experiments, a research paper can be published. A research paper may also be a collection of previously conducted research (discovery) and their proper interpretation. It might or might not result in new innovation. The research paper’s primary goal is to communicate research results to the related scientific community as well as the general public.

Below is the representation of the front page of the Research Paper:

The patent is a proprietary right granted to an inventor by a sovereign body. In return for a full disclosure of the invention, the inventor receives exclusive access to the copyrighted method, concept, or invention for a set period of time. They are a kind of intangible right. A patent can be granted to an apparatus, modern use of existing material, a procedure, or an improvement on an established invention if they can be shown to be new, usable, and not apparent to a person experienced in the field. It is government-issued intellectual property rights (IPR) that restricts others from using, making, offering for sale, or importing to the jurisdiction.

Below is the representation of the front page of the Patent:

Below is the table for a quick comparison between the research paper and the patent:

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• Published: 04 January 2023

Papers and patents are becoming less disruptive over time

• Michael Park   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-8373-5480 1 ,
• Erin Leahey 2 &
• Russell J. Funk   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-6670-4981 1  

Nature volume  613 ,  pages 138–144 ( 2023 ) Cite this article

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Theories of scientific and technological change view discovery and invention as endogenous processes 1 , 2 , wherein previous accumulated knowledge enables future progress by allowing researchers to, in Newton’s words, ‘stand on the shoulders of giants’ 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 . Recent decades have witnessed exponential growth in the volume of new scientific and technological knowledge, thereby creating conditions that should be ripe for major advances 8 , 9 . Yet contrary to this view, studies suggest that progress is slowing in several major fields 10 , 11 . Here, we analyse these claims at scale across six decades, using data on 45 million papers and 3.9 million patents from six large-scale datasets, together with a new quantitative metric—the CD index 12 —that characterizes how papers and patents change networks of citations in science and technology. We find that papers and patents are increasingly less likely to break with the past in ways that push science and technology in new directions. This pattern holds universally across fields and is robust across multiple different citation- and text-based metrics 1 , 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 , 17 . Subsequently, we link this decline in disruptiveness to a narrowing in the use of previous knowledge, allowing us to reconcile the patterns we observe with the ‘shoulders of giants’ view. We find that the observed declines are unlikely to be driven by changes in the quality of published science, citation practices or field-specific factors. Overall, our results suggest that slowing rates of disruption may reflect a fundamental shift in the nature of science and technology.

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Although the past century witnessed an unprecedented expansion of scientific and technological knowledge, there are concerns that innovative activity is slowing 18 , 19 , 20 . Studies document declining research productivity in semiconductors, pharmaceuticals and other fields 10 , 11 . Papers, patents and even grant applications have become less novel relative to prior work and less likely to connect disparate areas of knowledge, both of which are precursors of innovation 21 , 22 . The gap between the year of discovery and the awarding of a Nobel Prize has also increased 23 , 24 , suggesting that today’s contributions do not measure up to the past. These trends have attracted increasing attention from policymakers, as they pose substantial threats to economic growth, human health and wellbeing, and national security, along with global efforts to combat grand challenges such as climate change 25 , 26 .

Numerous explanations for this slowdown have been proposed. Some point to a dearth of ‘low-hanging fruit’ as the readily available productivity-enhancing innovations have already been made 19 , 27 . Others emphasize the increasing burden of knowledge; scientists and inventors require ever more training to reach the frontiers of their fields, leaving less time to push those frontiers forward 18 , 28 . Yet much remains unknown, not merely about the causes of slowing innovative activity, but also the depth and breadth of the phenomenon. The decline is difficult to reconcile with centuries of observation by philosophers of science, who characterize the growth of knowledge as an endogenous process, wherein previous knowledge enables future discovery, a view captured famously in Newton’s observation that if he had seen further, it was by ‘standing on the shoulders of giants’ 3 . Moreover, to date, the evidence pointing to a slowdown is based on studies of particular fields, using disparate and domain-specific metrics 10 , 11 , making it difficult to know whether the changes are happening at similar rates across areas of science and technology. Little is also known about whether the patterns seen in aggregate indicators mask differences in the degree to which individual works push the frontier.

We address these gaps in understanding by analysing 25 million papers (1945–2010) in the Web of Science (WoS) ( Methods ) and 3.9 million patents (1976–2010) in the United States Patent and Trademark Office’s (USPTO) Patents View database ( Methods ). The WoS data include 390 million citations, 25 million paper titles and 13 million abstracts. The Patents View data include 35 million citations, 3.9 million patent titles and 3.9 million abstracts. Subsequently, we replicate our core findings on four additional datasets—JSTOR, the American Physical Society corpus, Microsoft Academic Graph and PubMed—encompassing 20 million papers. Using these data, we join a new citation-based measure 12 with textual analyses of titles and abstracts to understand whether papers and patents forge new directions over time and across fields.

Measurement of disruptiveness

To characterize the nature of innovation, we draw on foundational theories of scientific and technological change 2 , 29 , 30 , which distinguish between two types of breakthroughs. First, some contributions improve existing streams of knowledge, and therefore consolidate the status quo. Kohn and Sham (1965) 31 , a Nobel-winning paper used established theorems to develop a method for calculating the structure of electrons, which cemented the value of previous research. Second, some contributions disrupt existing knowledge, rendering it obsolete, and propelling science and technology in new directions. Watson and Crick (1953) 32 , also a Nobel winner, introduced a model of the structure of DNA that superseded previous approaches (for example, Pauling’s triple helix). Kohn and Sham and Watson and Crick were both important, but their implications for scientific and technological change were different.

We quantify this distinction using a measure—the CD index 12 —that characterizes the consolidating or disruptive nature of science and technology (Fig. 1 ). The intuition is that if a paper or patent is disruptive, the subsequent work that cites it is less likely to also cite its predecessors; for future researchers, the ideas that went into its production are less relevant (for example, Pauling’s triple helix). If a paper or patent is consolidating, subsequent work that cites it is also more likely to cite its predecessors; for future researchers, the knowledge upon which the work builds is still (and perhaps more) relevant (for example, the theorems Kohn and Sham used). The CD index ranges from −1 (consolidating) to 1 (disruptive). We measure the CD index five years after the year of each paper’s publication (indicated by CD 5 , see Extended Data Fig. 1 for the distribution of CD 5 among papers and patents and Extended Data Fig. 2 for analyses using alternative windows) 33 . For example, Watson and Crick and Kohn and Sham both received over a hundred citations within five years of being published. However, the Kohn and Sham paper has a CD 5 of −0.22 (indicating consolidation), whereas the Watson and Crick paper has a CD 5 of 0.62 (indicating disruption). The CD index has been validated extensively in previous research, including through correlation with expert assessments 12 , 34 .

This figure shows a schematic visualization of the CD index. a , CD index value of three Nobel Prize-winning papers 31 , 32 , 58 and three notable patents 59 , 60 , 61 in our sample, measured as of five years post-publication (indicated by CD5). b , Distribution of CD 5 for papers from WoS ( n  = 24,659,076) between 1945 and 2010 and patents from Patents View ( n  = 3,912,353) between 1976 and 2010, where a single dot represents a paper or patent. The vertical (up–down) dimension of each ‘strip’ corresponds to values of the CD index (with axis values shown in orange on the left). The horizontal (left–right) dimension of each strip helps to minimize overlapping points. Darker areas on each strip plot indicate denser regions of the distribution (that is, more commonly observed CD 5 values). Additional details on the distribution of the CD index are given in Extended Data Fig. 1 . c , Three hypothetical citation networks, where the CD index is at the maximally disruptive value (CD t  = 1), midpoint value (CD t  = 0), and maximally consolidating value (CD t  = −1). The panel also provides the equation for the CD index and an illustrative calculation.

Declining disruptiveness

Across fields, we find that science and technology are becoming less disruptive. Figure 2 plots the average CD 5 over time for papers (Fig. 2a ) and patents (Fig. 2b ). For papers, the decrease between 1945 and 2010 ranges from 91.9% (where the average CD 5 dropped from 0.52 in 1945 to 0.04 in 2010 for ‘social sciences’) to 100% (where the average CD 5 decreased from 0.36 in 1945 to 0 in 2010 for ‘physical sciences’); for patents, the decrease between 1980 and 2010 ranges from 78.7% (where the average CD 5 decreased from 0.30 in 1980 to 0.06 in 2010 for ‘computers and communications’) to 91.5% (where the average CD 5 decreased from 0.38 in 1980 to 0.03 in 2010 for ‘drugs and medical’). For both papers and patents, the rates of decline are greatest in the earlier parts of the time series, and for patents, they appear to begin stabilizing between the years 2000 and 2005. For papers, since about 1980, the rate of decline has been more modest in ‘life sciences and biomedicine’ and physical sciences, and most marked and persistent in social sciences and ‘technology’. Overall, however, relative to earlier eras, recent papers and patents do less to push science and technology in new directions. The general similarity in trends we observe across fields is noteworthy in light of ‘low-hanging fruit’ theories 19 , 27 , which would probably predict greater heterogeneity in the decline, as it seems unlikely fields would ‘consume’ their low-hanging fruit at similar rates or times.

a , b , Decline in CD 5 over time, separately for papers ( a , n  = 24,659,076) and patents ( b , n  = 3,912,353). For papers, lines correspond to WoS research areas; from 1945 to 2010 the magnitude of decline ranges from 91.9% (social sciences) to 100% (physical sciences). For patents, lines correspond to National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) technology categories; from 1980 to 2010 the magnitude of decline ranges from 93.5% (computers and communications) to 96.4% (drugs and medical). Shaded bands correspond to 95% confidence intervals. As we elaborate in the Methods , this pattern of decline is robust to adjustment for confounding from changes in publication, citation and authorship practices over time.

Source data

Linguistic change.

The decline in disruptive science and technology is also observable using alternative indicators. Because they create departures from the status quo, disruptive papers and patents are likely to introduce new words (for example, words used to create a new paradigm might differ from those that are used to develop an existing paradigm) 35 , 36 . Therefore, if disruptiveness is declining, we would expect a decline in the diversity of words used in science and technology. To evaluate this, Fig. 3a , d documents the type-token ratio (that is, unique/total words) of paper and patent titles over time (Supplementary Information section  1 ). We observe substantial declines, especially in the earlier periods, before 1970 for papers and 1990 for patents. For paper titles (Fig. 3a ), the decrease (1945–2010) ranges from 76.5% (social sciences) to 88% (technology); for patent titles (Fig. 3d ), the decrease (1980–2010) ranges from 32.5% (chemical) to 81% (computers and communications). For paper abstracts (Extended Data Fig. 3a ), the decrease (1992–2010) ranges from 23.1% (life sciences and biomedicine) to 38.9% (social sciences); for patent abstracts (Extended Data Fig. 3b ), the decrease (1980–2010) ranges from 21.5% (mechanical) to 73.2% (computers and communications). In Fig. 3b , e , we demonstrate that these declines in word diversity are accompanied by similar declines in combinatorial novelty; over time, the particular words that scientists and inventors use in the titles of their papers and patents are increasingly likely to have been used together in the titles of previous work. Consistent with these trends in language, we also observe declining novelty in the combinations of previous work cited by papers and patents, based on a previously established measure of ‘atypical combinations’ 14 (Extended Data Fig. 4 ).

a , d , Figures showing a decline in the diversity of language used in science and technology based on the unique/total words of paper titles from 1945 to 2010 ( a , n  = 24,659,076) and of patent titles from 1980 to 2010 ( d , n  = 3,912,353). b , e , Figures showing a decline in the novelty of language used in science and technology based on the number of new word pairs/total word pairs introduced each year in WoS paper titles from 1945 to 2010 ( b ) and in Patents View patent titles from 1980 to 2010 (refs. 1 , 17 ) ( e ). For papers in both a and b , lines correspond to WoS research areas ( n  = 264 WoS research area × year observations). For patents in both d and e , lines correspond to NBER technology categories ( n  = 229 NBER technology category × year observations). c , f , Figures showing the frequency of the most commonly used verbs in paper titles for the first (red) and last (blue) decades of the observation period in paper ( c , n  = 24,659,076) and patent ( f , n  = 3,912,353) titles.

The decline in disruptive activity is also apparent in the specific words used by scientists and inventors. If disruptiveness is declining, we reasoned that verbs alluding to the creation, discovery or perception of new things should be used less frequently over time, whereas verbs alluding to the improvement, application or assessment of existing things may be used more often 35 , 36 . Figure 3 shows the most common verbs in paper (Fig. 3c ) and patent titles (Fig. 3f ) in the first and last decade of each sample (Supplementary Information section  2 ). Although precisely and quantitatively characterizing words as ‘consolidating’ or ‘disruptive’ is challenging in the absence of context, the figure highlights a clear and qualitative shift in language. In the earlier decades, verbs evoking creation (for example, ‘produce’, ‘form’, ‘prepare’ and ‘make’), discovery (for example, ‘determine’ and ‘report’) and perception (for example, ‘measure’) are prevalent in both paper and patent titles. In the later decades, however, these verbs are almost completely displaced by those tending to be more evocative of the improvement (for example, ‘improve’, ‘enhance’ and ‘increase’), application (for example, ‘use’ and ‘include’) or assessment (for example, ‘associate’, ‘mediate’ and ‘relate’) of existing scientific and technological knowledge and artefacts. Taken together, these patterns suggest a substantive shift in science and technology over time, with discovery and invention becoming less disruptive in nature, consistent with our results using the CD index.

Conservation of highly disruptive work

The aggregate trends we document mask considerable heterogeneity in the disruptiveness of individual papers and patents and remarkable stability in the absolute number of highly disruptive works ( Methods and Fig. 4 ). Specifically, despite large increases in scientific productivity, the number of papers and patents with CD 5 values in the far right tail of the distribution remains nearly constant over time. This ‘conservation’ of the absolute number of highly disruptive papers and patents holds despite considerable churn in the underlying fields responsible for producing those works (Extended Data Fig. 5 , inset). These results suggest that the persistence of major breakthroughs—for example, measurement of gravity waves and COVID-19 vaccines—is not inconsistent with slowing innovative activity. In short, declining aggregate disruptiveness does not preclude individual highly disruptive works.

This figure shows the number of disruptive papers ( a , n  = 5,030,179) and patents ( b , n  = 1,476,004) across four different ranges of CD 5 (papers and patents with CD 5 values in the range [−1.0, 0) are not represented in the figure). Lines correspond to different levels of disruptiveness as measured by CD 5 . Despite substantial increases in the numbers of papers and patents published each year, there is little change in the number of highly disruptive papers and patents, as evidenced by the relatively flat red, green and orange lines. This pattern helps to account for simultaneous observations of both aggregate evidence of slowing innovative activity and seemingly major breakthroughs in many fields of science and technology. The inset plots show the composition of the most disruptive papers and patents (defined as those with CD 5 values >0.25) by field over time. The observed stability in the absolute number of highly disruptive papers and patents holds despite considerable churn in the underlying fields of science and technology responsible for producing those works. ‘Life sciences’ denotes the life sciences and biomedicine research area; ‘electrical’ denotes the electrical and electronic technology category; ‘drugs’ denotes the drugs and medical technology category; and ‘computers’ denotes the computers and communications technology category.

Alternative explanations

What is driving the decline in disruptiveness? Earlier, we suggested our results are not consistent with explanations that link slowing innovative activity to diminishing ‘low-hanging fruit’. Extended Data Fig. 5 shows that the decline in disruptiveness is unlikely to be due to other field-specific factors by decomposing variation in CD 5 attributable to field, author and year effects ( Methods ).

Declining rates of disruptive activity are unlikely to be caused by the diminishing quality of science and technology 22 , 37 . If they were, then the patterns seen in Fig. 2 should be less visible in high-quality work. However, when we restrict our sample to articles published in premier publication venues such as Nature , Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and Science or to Nobel-winning discoveries 38 (Fig. 5 ), the downward trend persists.

This figure shows changes in CD 5 over time for papers published in Nature , Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences ( PNAS ) and Science (inset plot, n  = 223,745) and Nobel Prize-winning papers (main plot, n  = 635), with several notable examples 31 , 32 , 58 , 62 , 63 , 64 , 65 , 66 highlighted. Colours indicate the three different journals in the inset plot; colours indicate the three different fields in which the Nobel Prize is awarded in the main plot. Shaded bands correspond to 95% confidence intervals. For historical completeness, we plot CD index scores for all Nobel papers back to 1900 (the first year in which the prize was awarded); however, our main analyses begin in the post-1945 era, when the WoS data are generally more reliable. The figure indicates that changes in the quality of published science over time is unlikely to be responsible for the decline in disruption.

Furthermore, the trend is not driven by characteristics of the WoS and UPSTO data or our particular derivation of the CD index; we observe similar declines in disruptiveness when we compute CD 5 on papers in JSTOR, the American Physical Society corpus, Microsoft Academic Graph and PubMed ( Methods ), the results of which are shown in Extended Data Fig. 6 . We further show that the decline is not an artefact of the CD index by reporting similar patterns using alternative derivations 13 , 15 ( Methods and Extended Data Fig. 7 ).

Declines in disruptiveness are also not attributable to changing publication, citation or authorship practices ( Methods ). First, using approaches from the bibliometrics literature 39 , 40 , 41 , 42 , 43 , we computed several normalized versions of the CD index that adjusted for the increasing tendency for papers and patents to cite previous work 44 , 45 . Results using these alternative indicators (Extended Data Fig. 8a , d ) were similar to those we reported in Fig. 2 . Second, using regression, we estimated models of CD 5 as a function of indicator variables for each paper or patent’s publication year, along with specific controls for field × year level—number of new papers/patents, mean number of papers/patents cited, mean number of authors or inventors per paper—and paper or patent-level—number of papers or patents cited—factors. Predictions from these models indicated a decline in disruptive papers and patents (Extended Data Fig. 8b , e and Supplementary Table 1 ) that was consistent with our main results. Finally, using Monte Carlo simulations, we randomly rewired the observed citation networks while preserving key characteristics of scientists’ and inventors’ citation behaviour, including the number of citations made and received by individual papers and patents and the age gap between citing and cited works. We find that observed CD 5 values are lower than those from the simulated networks (Extended Data Fig. 8 c, f ), and the gap is widening: over time, papers and patents are increasingly less disruptive than would be expected by chance. Taken together, these additional analyses indicate that the decline in CD 5 is unlikely to be driven by changing publication, citation or authorship practices.

Growth of knowledge and disruptiveness

We also considered how declining disruptiveness relates to the growth of knowledge (Extended Data Fig. 9 ). On the one hand, scientists and inventors face an increasing knowledge burden, which may inhibit discoveries and inventions that disrupt the status quo. On the other hand, as previously noted, philosophers of science suggest that existing knowledge fosters discovery and invention 3 , 6 , 7 . Using regression models, we evaluated the relationship between the stock of papers and patents (a proxy for knowledge) within fields and their CD 5 (Supplementary Information section  3 and Supplementary Table 2 ). We find a positive effect of the growth of knowledge on disruptiveness for papers, consistent with previous work 20 ; however, we find a negative effect for patents.

Given these conflicting results, we considered the possibility that the availability of knowledge may differ from its use. In particular, the growth in publishing and patenting may lead scientists and inventors to focus on narrower slices of previous work 18 , 46 , thereby limiting the ‘effective’ stock of knowledge. Using three proxies, we document a decline in the use of previous knowledge among scientists and inventors (Fig. 6 ). First, we see a decline in the diversity of work cited (Fig. 6a,d ), indicating that contemporary science and technology are engaging with narrower slices of existing knowledge. Moreover, this decline in diversity is accompanied by an increase in the share of citations to the 1% most highly cited papers and patents (Fig. 6a (i) , d(i) ), which are also decreasing in semantic diversity (Fig. 6a (ii) , d (ii) ). Over time, scientists and inventors are increasingly citing the same previous work, and that previous work is becoming more topically similar. Second, we see an increase in self-citation (Fig. 6b,e ), a common proxy for the continuation of one’s pre-existing research stream 47 , 48 , 49 , which is consistent with scientists and inventors relying more on highly familiar knowledge. Third, the mean age of work cited, a common measure for the use of dated knowledge 50 , 51 , 52 , is increasing (Fig. 6c,f ), suggesting that scientists and inventors may be struggling to keep up with the pace of knowledge expansion and instead relying on older, familiar work. All three indicators point to a consistent story: a narrower scope of existing knowledge is informing contemporary discovery and invention.

a – f , Changes in the level of diversity of existing scientific and technological knowledge use among papers ( a , n  = 264 WoS research area × year observations; b and c , n  = 24,659,076 papers) and patents ( d , 229 NBER technology category × year observations; e and f , n  = 3,912,353 patents) based on following measures: diversity of work cited ( a and d ), mean number of self-citations ( b and e ) and mean age of cited work ( c and f ). Shaded bands ( b , c , e and f ) correspond to 95% confidence intervals. The inset plots of a and d show changes in the share of citations to the top 1% most highly cited papers ( a (i) and d (i)) and in the semantic diversity of the top 1% most cited over time ( a (ii) and d (ii)). Values of both measures are computed within field and year, and are subsequently averaged across fields for plotting. Semantic diversity is based on paper and patent titles; values correspond to the ratio of the standard deviation to the mean pairwise cosine similarity (that is, the coefficient of variation) among the titles of the 1% most cited papers and patents by field and year. To enable semantic comparisons, titles were vectorized using pretrained word embeddings. For papers, lines are shown for each WoS research area; for patents, lines are shown for each NBER technology category. In subsequent regression analyses using these measures, we find that using less diverse work, more of one’s own work and older work is associated with less disruptive papers and patents ( Methods and Extended Data Table 1 ).

Results from a subsequent series of regression models suggest that use of less diverse work, more of one’s own work and older work are all negatively associated with disruption ( Methods , Extended Data Table 1 and Supplementary Table 3 ), a pattern that holds even after accounting for the average age and number of previous works produced by team members. When the range of work used by scientists and inventors narrows, disruptive activity declines.

In summary, we report a marked decline in disruptive science and technology over time. Our analyses show that this trend is unlikely to be driven by changes in citation practices or the quality of published work. Rather, the decline represents a substantive shift in science and technology, one that reinforces concerns about slowing innovative activity. We attribute this trend in part to scientists’ and inventors’ reliance on a narrower set of existing knowledge. Even though philosophers of science may be correct that the growth of knowledge is an endogenous process—wherein accumulated understanding promotes future discovery and invention—engagement with a broad range of extant knowledge is necessary for that process to play out, a requirement that appears more difficult with time. Relying on narrower slices of knowledge benefits individual careers 53 , but not scientific progress more generally.

Moreover, even though the prevalence of disruptive works has declined, we find that the sheer number has remained stable. On the one hand, this result may suggest that there is a fixed ‘carrying capacity’ for highly disruptive science and technology, in which case, policy interventions aimed at increasing such work may prove challenging. On the other hand, our observation of considerable churn in the underlying fields responsible for producing disruptive science and technology suggests the potential importance of factors such as the shifting interests of funders and scientists and the ‘ripeness’ of scientific and technologicalknowledge for breakthroughs, in which case the production of disruptive work may be responsive to policy levers. In either case, the stability we observe in the sheer number of disruptive papers and patents suggests that science and technology do not appear to have reached the end of the ‘endless frontier’. Room remains for the regular rerouting that disruptive works contribute to scientific and technological progress.

Our study is not without limitations. Notably, even though research to date supports the validity of the CD index 12 , 34 , it is a relatively new indicator of innovative activity and will benefit from future work on its behaviour and properties, especially across data sources and contexts. Studies that systematically examine the effect of different citation practices 54 , 55 , which vary across fields, would be particularly informative.

Overall, our results deepen understanding of the evolution of knowledge and may guide career planning and science policy. To promote disruptive science and technology, scholars may be encouraged to read widely and given time to keep up with the rapidly expanding knowledge frontier. Universities may forgo the focus on quantity, and more strongly reward research quality 56 , and perhaps more fully subsidize year-long sabbaticals. Federal agencies may invest in the riskier and longer-term individual awards that support careers and not simply specific projects 57 , giving scholars the gift of time needed to step outside the fray, inoculate themselves from the publish or perish culture, and produce truly consequential work. Understanding the decline in disruptive science and technology more fully permits a much-needed rethinking of strategies for organizing the production of science and technology in the future.

We limit our focus to research papers published between 1945 and 2010. Although the WoS data begin in the year 1900, the scale and social organization of science shifted markedly in the post-war era, thereby making comparisons with the present difficult and potentially misleading 67 , 68 , 69 . We end our analyses of papers in 2010 because some of our measures require several subsequent years of data following paper publication. The WoS data archive 65 million documents published in 28,968 journals between 1900 and 2017 and 735 million citations among them. In addition, the WoS data include the titles and the full text of abstracts for 65 and 29 million records, respectively, published between 1913 and 2017. After eliminating non-research documents (for example, book reviews and commentaries) and subsetting the data to the 1945–2010 window, the analytical sample consists of n  = 24,659,076 papers.

Patents View data

We limit our focus to patents granted from 1976, which is the earliest year for which machine-readable records are available in the Patents View data. As we did with papers, we end our analyses in 2010 because some measures require data from subsequent years for calculation. The Patents View data are the most exhaustive source of historical data on inventions, with information on 6.5 million patents granted between 1976 and 2017 and their corresponding 92 million citations. The Patents View data include the titles and abstracts for 6.5 million patents granted between 1976 and 2017. Following previous work 12 , we focused our attention on utility patents, which cover the vast majority (91% in our data) of patented inventions. After eliminating non-utility patents and subsetting the data to the 1976–2010 window, the analytical sample consists of n  = 3,912,353 patents.

Highly disruptive papers and patents

Observations (and claims) of slowing progress in science and technology are increasingly common, supported not only by the evidence we report, but also by previous research from diverse methodological and disciplinary perspectives 10 , 11 , 18 , 19 , 20 , 21 , 22 , 23 , 24 . Yet as noted in the main text, there is a tension between observations of slowing progress from aggregate data on the one hand, and continuing reports of seemingly major breakthroughs in many fields of science and technology—spanning everything from the measurement of gravity waves to the sequencing of the human genome—on the other. In an effort to reconcile this tension, we considered the possibility that whereas overall, discovery and invention may be less disruptive over time, the high-level view taken in previous work may mask considerable heterogeneity. Put differently, aggregate evidence of slowing progress does not preclude the possibility that some subset of discoveries and inventions is highly disruptive.

To evaluate this possibility, we plot the number of disruptive papers (Fig. 4a ) and patents (Fig. 4b ) over time, where disruptive papers and patents are defined as those with CD 5 values >0. Within each panel, we plot four lines, corresponding to four evenly spaced intervals—(0, 0.25], (0.25, 0.5], (0.5, 0.75], (0.75, 1.00]—over the positive values of CD 5 . The first two intervals therefore correspond to papers and patents that are relatively weakly disruptive, whereas the latter two correspond to those that are more strongly so (for example, where we may expect to see major breakthroughs such as some of those mentioned above). Despite major increases in the numbers of papers and patents published each year, we see little change in the number of highly disruptive papers and patents, as evidenced by the relatively flat red, green and orange lines. Notably, this ‘conservation’ of disruptive work holds even despite fluctuations over time in the composition of the scientific and technological fields responsible for producing the most disruptive work (Fig. 4 , inset plots). Overall, these results help to account for simultaneous observations of both major breakthroughs in many fields of science and technology and aggregate evidence of slowing progress.

Relative contribution of field, year and author or inventor effects

Our results show a steady decline in the disruptiveness of science and technology over time. Moreover, the patterns we observe are generally similar across broad fields of study, which suggests that the factors driving the decline are not unique to specific domains of science and technology. The decline could be driven by other factors, such as the conditions of science and technology at a point in time or the particular individuals who produce science and technology. For example, exogenous factors such as economic conditions may encourage research or invention practices that are less disruptive. Similarly, scientists and inventors of different generations may have different approaches, which may result in greater or lesser tendencies for producing disruptive work. We therefore sought to understand the relative contribution of field, year and author (or inventor) factors to the decline of disruptive science and technology.

To do so, we decomposed the relative contribution of field, year and author fixed effects to the predictive power of regression models of the CD index. The unit of observation in these regressions is the author (or inventor) × year. We enter field fixed effects using granular subfield indicators (that is, 150 WoS subject areas for papers, 138 NBER subcategories for patents). For simplicity, we did not include additional covariates beyond the fixed effects in our models. Field fixed effects capture all field-specific factors that do not vary by author or year (for example, the basic subject matter); year fixed effects capture all year-specific factors that do not vary by field or author (for example, the state of communication technology); author (or inventor) fixed effects capture all author-specific factors that do not vary by field or year (for example, the year of PhD awarding). After specifying our model, we determine the relative contribution of field, year and author fixed effects to the overall model adjusted R 2 using Shapley–Owen decomposition. Specifically, given our n  = 3 groups of fixed effects (field, year and author) we evaluate the relative contribution of each set of fixed effects by estimating the adjusted R 2 separately for the 2 n models using subsets of the predictors. The relative contribution of each set of fixed effects is then computed using the Shapley value from game theory 70 .

Results of this analysis are shown in Extended Data Fig. 5 , for both papers (top bar) and patents (bottom bar). Total bar size corresponds to the value of the adjusted R 2 for the fully specified model (that is, with all three groups of fixed effects). Consistent with our observations from plots of the CD index over time, we observe that for both papers and patents, field-specific factors make the lowest relative contribution to the adjusted R 2 (0.02 and 0.01 for papers and patents, respectively). Author fixed effects, by contrast, appear to contribute much more to the predictive power of the model, for both papers (0.20) and patents (0.17). Researchers and inventors who entered the field in more recent years may face a higher burden of knowledge and thus resort to building on narrower slices of existing work (for example, because of more specialized doctoral training), which would generally lead to less disruptive science and technology being produced in later years, consistent with our findings. The pattern is more complex for year fixed effects; although year-specific factors that do not vary by field or author hold more explanatory power than field for both papers (0.02) and patents (0.16), they appear to be substantially more important for the latter than the former. Taken together, these findings suggest that relatively stable factors that vary across individual scientists and inventors may be particularly important for understanding changes in disruptiveness over time. The results also confirm that domain-specific factors across fields of science and technology play a very small role in explaining the decline in disruptiveness of papers and patents.

Alternative samples

We also considered whether the patterns we document may be artefacts of our choice of data sources. Although we observe consistent trends in both the WoS and Patents View data, and both databases are widely used by the Science of Science community, our results may conceivably be driven by factors such as changes in coverage (for example, journals added or excluded from WoS over time) or even data errors rather than fundamental changes in science and technology. To evaluate this possibility, we therefore calculated CD 5 for papers in four additional databases—JSTOR, the American Physical Society corpus, Microsoft Academic Graph and PubMed. We included all records from 1930 to 2010 from PubMed (16,774,282 papers), JSTOR (1,703,353 papers) and American Physical Society (478,373 papers). The JSTOR data were obtained via a special request from ITHAKA, the data maintainer ( http://www.ithaka.org ), as were the American Physical Society data ( https://journals.aps.org/datasets ). We downloaded the Microsoft Academic Graph data from CADRE at Indiana University ( https://cadre.iu.edu/ ). The PubMed data were downloaded from the National Library of Medicine FTP server ( ftp://ftp.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/baseline ). Owing to the exceptionally large scale of Microsoft Academic Graph and the associated computational burden, we randomly extracted 1 million papers. As shown in Extended Data Fig. 6 , the downward trend in disruptiveness is evident across all samples.

Alternative bibliometric measures

Several recent papers have introduced alternative specifications of the CD index 12 . We evaluated whether the declines in disruptiveness we observe are corroborated using two alternative variations. One criticism of the CD index has been that the number of papers that cite only the focal paper’s references dominates the measure 13 . Bornmann et al. 13 proposes \({{\rm{DI}}}_{l}^{{\rm{nok}}}\) as a variant that is less susceptible to this issue. Another potential weakness of the CD index is that it could be very sensitive to small changes in the forward citation patterns of papers that make no backward citations 15 . Leydesdorff et al. 15 suggests DI* as an alternate indicator of disruption that addresses this issue. Therefore, we calculated \({{\rm{DI}}}_{l}^{{\rm{nok}}}\) where l  = 5 and DI* for 100,000 randomly drawn papers and patents each from our analytic sample. Results are presented in Extended Data Fig. 7a (papers) and b (patents). The blue lines indicate disruption based on Bornmann et al. 13 and the orange lines indicate disruption based on Leydesdorff et al. 15 . Across science and technology, the two alternative measures both show declines in disruption over time, similar to the patterns observed with the CD index. Taken together, these results suggest that the declines in disruption we document are not an artefact of our particular operationalization.

Robustness to changes in publication, citation and authorship practices

We also considered whether our results may be attributable to changes in publication, citation or authorship practices, rather than by substantive shifts in discovery and invention. Perhaps most critically, as noted in the main text, there has been a marked expansion in publishing and patenting over the period of our study. This expansion has naturally increased the amount of previous work that is relevant to current science and technology and therefore at risk of being cited, a pattern reflected in the marked increase in the average number of citations made by papers and patents (that is, papers and patents are citing more previous work than in previous eras) 44 , 45 . Recall that the CD index quantifies the degree to which future work cites a focal work together with its predecessors (that is, the references in the bibliography of the focal work). Greater citation of a focal work independently of its predecessors is taken to be evidence of a social process of disruption. As papers and patents cite more previous work, however, the probability of a focal work being cited independently of its predecessors may decline mechanically; the more citations a focal work makes, the more likely future work is to cite it together with one of its predecessors, even by chance. Consequently, increases in the number of papers and patents available for citing and in the average number of citations made by scientists and inventors may contribute to the declining values of the CD index. In short, given the marked changes in science and technology over our long study window, the CD index of papers and patents published in earlier periods may not be directly comparable to those of more recent vintage, which could in turn render our conclusions about the decline in disruptive science and technology suspect. We addressed these concerns using three distinctive but complementary approaches—normalization, regression adjustment and simulation.

Verification using normalization

First, following common practice in bibliometric research 39 , 40 , 41 , 42 , 43 , we developed two normalized versions of the CD index, with the goal of facilitating comparisons across time. Among the various components of the CD index, we focused our attention on the count of papers or patents that only cite the focal work’s references ( N k ), as this term would seem most likely to scale with the increases in publishing and patenting and in the average number of citations made by papers and patents to previous work 13 . Larger values of N k lead to smaller values of the CD index. Consequently, marked increases in N k over time, particularly relative to other components of the measure, may lead to a downward bias, thereby inhibiting our ability to accurately compare disruptive science and technology in later years with earlier periods.

Our two normalized versions of the CD index aim to address this potential bias by attenuating the effect of increases in N k . In the first version, which we call ‘Paper normalized’, we subtract from N k the number of citations made by the focal paper or patent to previous work ( N b ). The intuition behind this adjustment is that when a focal paper or patent cites more previous work, N k is likely to be larger because there are more opportunities for future work to cite the focal paper or patent’s predecessors. This increase in N k would result in lower values of the CD index, although not necessarily as a result of the focal paper or patent being less disruptive. In the second version, which we call ‘field × year normalized’, we subtract N k by the average number of backward citations made by papers or patents in the focal paper or patent’s WoS research area or NBER technology category, respectively, during its year of publication (we label this quantity \({N}_{{\rm{b}}}^{{\rm{m}}{\rm{e}}{\rm{a}}{\rm{n}}}\) ). The intuition behind this adjustment is that in fields and time periods in which there is a greater tendency for scientists and inventors to cite previous work, N k is also likely to be larger, thereby leading to lower values of the CD index, although again not necessarily as a result of the focal paper or patent being less disruptive. In cases in which either N b or \({N}_{{\rm{b}}}^{{\rm{m}}{\rm{e}}{\rm{a}}{\rm{n}}}\) exceed the value of N k , we set N k to 0 (that is, N k is never negative in the normalized measures). Both adaptations of the CD index are inspired by established approaches in the scientometrics literature, and may be understood as a form of ‘citing side normalization’ (that is, normalization by correcting for the effect of differences in lengths of references lists) 40 .

In Extended Data Fig. 8 , we plot the average values of both normalized versions of the CD index over time, separately for papers (Extended Data Fig. 8a ) and patents (Extended Data Fig. 8d ). Consistent with our findings reported in the main text, we continue to observe a decline in the CD index over time, suggesting that the patterns we observe in disruptive science and technology are unlikely to be driven by changes in citation practices.

Verification using regression adjustment

Second, we adjusted for potential confounding using a regression-based approach. This approach complements the bibliometric normalizations just described by allowing us to account for a broader array of changes in publication, citation and authorship practices in general (the latter of which is not directly accounted for in either the normalization approach or the simulation approach described next), and increases the amount of previous work that is relevant to current science and technology in particular. In Supplementary Table 1 , we report the results of regression models predicting CD 5 for papers (Models 1–4) and patents (Models 5–8), with indicator variables included for each year of our study window (the reference categories are 1945 and 1980 for papers and patents, respectively). Models 1 and 4 are the baseline models, and include no other adjustments beyond the year indicators. In Models 2 and 5, we add subfield fixed effects (WoS subject areas for papers and NBER technology subcategories for patents). Finally, in Models 3–4 and 7–8, we add control variables for several field × year level—number of new papers orpatents, mean number of papers or patents cited, mean number of authors or inventors per paper—and paper- or patent-level—number of papers or patents cited—characteristics, thereby enabling more robust comparisons in patterns of disruptive science and technology over the long time period spanned by our study. For the paper models, we also include a paper-level control for the number of unlinked references (that is, the number of citations to works that are not indexed in WoS). We find that the inclusion of these controls improves model fit, as indicated by statistically significant Wald tests presented below the relevant models.

Across all eight models shown in Supplementary Table 1 , we find that the coefficients on the year indicators are statistically significant and negative, and growing in magnitude over time, which is consistent with the patterns we reported based on unadjusted CD 5 values index in the main text (Fig. 2 ). In Extended Data Fig. 8 , we visualize the results of our regression-based approach by plotting the predicted CD 5 values separately for each of the year indicators included in Models 4 (papers) and 8 (patents). To enable comparisons with raw CD 5 values shown in the main text, we present the separate predictions made for each year as a line graph. As shown in the figure, we continue to observe declining values of the CD index across papers and patents, even when accounting for changes in publication, citation and authorship practices.

Verification using simulation

Third, following related work in the Science of Science 14 , 71 , 72 , 73 , we considered whether our results may be an artefact of changing patterns in publishing and citation practices by using a simulation approach. In essence, the CD index measures disruption by characterizing the network of citations around a focal paper or patent. However, many complex networks, even those resulting from random processes, exhibit structures that yield non-trivial values on common network measures (for example, clustering) 74 , 75 , 76 . During the period spanned by our study, the citation networks of science and technology experienced significant change, with marked increases in both the numbers of nodes (that is, papers or patents) and edges (that is, citations). Thus, rather than reflecting a meaningful social process, the observed declines in disruption may result from these structural changes in the underlying citation networks.

To evaluate this possibility, we followed standard techniques from network science 75 , 77 and conducted an analysis in which we recomputed the CD index on randomly rewired citation networks. If the patterns we observe in the CD index are the result of structural changes in the citation networks of science and technology (for example, growth in the number of nodes or edges) rather than a meaningful social process, then these patterns should also be visible in comparable random networks that experience similar structural changes. Therefore, finding that the patterns we see in the CD index differ for the observed and random citation networks would serve as evidence that the decline in disruption is not an artefact of the data.

We began by creating copies of the underlying citation network on which the values of the CD index used in all analyses reported in the main text were based, separately for papers and patents. For each citation network (one for papers, one for patents), we then rewired citations using a degree-preserving randomization algorithm. In each iteration of the algorithm, two edges (for example, A–B and C–D) are selected from the underlying citation network, after which the algorithm attempts to swap the two endpoints of the edges (for example, A–B becomes A–D, and C–D becomes C–B). If the degree centrality of A, B, C and D remains the same after the swap, the swap is retained; otherwise, the algorithm discards the swap and moves on to the next iteration. When evaluating degree centrality, we consider ‘in-degree’ (that is, citations from other papers or patents to the focal paper or patent) and ‘out-degree’ (that is, citations from the focal paper or patent to other papers or patents) separately. Furthermore, we also required that the age distribution of citing and cited papers or patents was identical in the original and rewired networks. Specifically, swaps were only retained when the publication year of the original and candidate citations was the same. In light of these design choices, our rewiring algorithm should be seen as fairly conservative, as it preserves substantial structure from the original network. There is no scholarly consensus on the number of swaps necessary to ensure the original and rewired networks are sufficiently different from one another; the rule we adopt here is 100 ×  m , where m is the number of edges in the network being rewired.

Following previous work 14 , we created ten rewired copies of the observed citation networks for both papers and patents. After creating these rewired citation networks, we then recomputed CD 5 . Owing to the large scale of the WoS data, we base our analyses on a random subsample of ten million papers; CD 5 was computed on the rewired network for all patents. For each paper and patent, we then compute a z score that compares the observed CD 5 value to those of the same paper or patent in the ten rewired citation networks. Positive z scores indicate that the observed CD 5 value is greater (that is, more disruptive) than would be expected by chance; negative z scores indicate that the observed values are lesser (that is, more consolidating).

The results of these analyses are shown in Extended Data Fig. 8 , separately for papers (Extended Data Fig. 8c ) and patents (Extended Data Fig. 8f ). Lines correspond to the average z score among papers or patents published in the focal year. The plots reveal a pattern of change in the CD index over and beyond that ‘baked in’ to the changing structure of the network. We find that on average, papers and patents tend to be less disruptive than would be expected by chance, and moreover, the gap between the observed CD index values and those from the randomly rewired networks is increasing over time, which is consistent with our findings of a decline in disruptive science and technology.

Taken together, the results of the foregoing analyses suggest that although there have been marked changes in science and technology over the course of our long study window, particularly with respect to publication, citation and authorship practices, the decline in disruptive science and technology that we document using the CD index is unlikely to be an artefact of these changes, and instead represents a substantive shift in the nature of discovery and invention.

Regression analysis

We evaluate the relationship between disruptiveness and the use of previous knowledge using regression models, predicting CD 5 for individual papers and patents, based on three indicators of previous knowledge use—the diversity of work cited, mean number of self-citations and mean age of work cited. Our measure of the diversity of work cited is measured at the field × year level; all other variables included in the regressions are defined at the level of the paper or patent. To account for potential confounding factors, our models included year and field fixed effects. Year fixed effects account for time variant factors that affect all observations (papers or patents) equally (for example, global economic trends). Field fixed effects account for field-specific factors that do not change over time (for example, some fields may intrinsically value disruptive work over consolidating ones). In contrast to our descriptive plots, for our regression models, we adjust for field effects using the more granular 150 WoS ‘extended subjects’ (for example, ‘biochemistry and molecular biology’, ‘biophysics’, ‘biotechnology and applied microbiology’, ‘cell biology’, ‘developmental biology’, ‘evolutionary biology’ and ‘microbiology’ are extended subjects within the life sciences and biomedicine research area) and 38 NBER technology subcategories (for example, ‘agriculture’, ‘food’, ‘textile’; ‘coating’; ‘gas’; ‘organic’; and ‘resins’ are subcategories within the chemistry technology category).

In addition, we also include controls for the ‘mean age of team members’ (that is, ‘career age’, defined as the difference between the publication year of the focal paper or patent and the first year in which each author or inventor published a paper or patent) and the ‘mean number of previous works produced by team members’. Although increases in rates of self-citations may indicate that scientists and inventors are becoming more narrowly focused on their own work, these rates may also be driven in part by the amount of previous work available for self-citing. Similarly, although increases in the age of work cited in papers and patents may indicate that scientists and inventors are struggling to keep up, they may also be driven by the rapidly aging workforce in science and technology 78 , 79 . For example, older scientists and inventors may be more familiar with or more attentive to older work, or may actively resist change 80 . These control variables help to account for these alternative explanations.

Supplementary Table 3 shows summary statistics for variables used in the ordinary-least-squares regression models. The diversity of work cited is measured by normalized entropy, which ranges from 0 to 1. Greater values on this measure indicate a more uniform distribution of citations to a wider range of existing work; lower values indicate a more concentrated distribution of citations to a smaller range of existing work. The tables show that the normalized entropy in a given field and year has a nearly maximal average entropy of 0.98 for both science and technology. About 16% of papers cited in a paper are by an author of the focal paper; the corresponding number for patents is about 7%. Papers tend to rely on older work and work that varies more greatly in age (measured by standard deviation) than patents. In addition, the average CD 5 of a paper is 0.04 whereas the average CD 5 of a patent is 0.12, meaning that the average paper tends to be less disruptive than the average patent.

We find that using more diverse work, less of one’s own work and older work tends to be associated with the production of more disruptive science and technology, even after accounting for the average age and number of previous works produced by team members. These findings are based on our regression results, shown in Extended Data Table 1 . Models 6 and 12 present the full regression models. The models indicate a consistent pattern for both science and technology, wherein the coefficients for diversity of work cited are positive and significant for papers (0.159, P  < 0.01) and patents (0.069, P  < 0.01), indicating that in fields in which there is more use of diverse work, there is greater disruption. Holding all other variables at their means, the predicted CD 5 of papers and patents increases by 303.5% and 1.3%, respectively, when the diversity of work cited increases by 1 s.d. The coefficients of the ratio of self-citations to total work cited is negative and significant for papers (−0.011, P  < 0.01) and patents (−0.060, P  < 0.01), showing that when researchers or inventors rely more on their own work, discovery and invention tends to be less disruptive. Again holding all other variables at their means, the predicted CD 5 of papers and patents decreases by 622.9% and 18.5%, respectively, with a 1 s.d. increase in the ratio. The coefficients of the interaction between mean age of work cited and dispersion in age of work cited is positive and significant for papers (0.000, P  < 0.01) and patents (0.001, P  < 0.01), suggesting that—holding the dispersion of the age of work cited constant—papers and patents that engage with older work are more likely to be disruptive. The predicted CD 5 of papers and patents increases by a striking 2,072.4% and 58.4%, respectively, when the mean age of work cited increases by 1 s.d. (about nine and eight years for papers and patents, respectively), again holding all other variables at their means. In summary, the regression results suggest that changes in the use of previous knowledge may contribute to the production of less disruptive science and technology.

Reporting summary

Further information on research design is available in the  Nature Portfolio Reporting Summary linked to this article.

Data availability

Data associated with this study are freely available in a public repository at https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.7258379 . Our study draws on data from six sources: the American Physical Society, JSTOR, Microsoft Academic Graph, Patents View, PubMed and WoS. Data from Microsoft Academic Graph, Patents View and PubMed are publicly available, and our repository includes complete data for analyses from these sources. Data from the American Physical Society, JSTOR and WoS are not publicly available, and were used under licence from their respective publishers. To facilitate replication, our repository includes limited versions of the data from these sources, which will enable calculation of basic descriptive statistics. The authors will make full versions of these data available upon request and with permission from their respective publishers.  Source data are provided with this paper.

Code availability

Open-source code related to this study is available at https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.7258379 and http://www.cdindex.info . We used Python v.3.10.6 (pandas v.1.4.3, numpy v.1.23.1, matplotlib v.3.5.2, seaborn v.0.11.2, spacy v.2.2, jupyterlab v.3.4.4) to wrangle, analyse and visualize data and to conduct statistical analyses. We used MariaDB v.10.6.4 to wrangle data. We used R v.4.2.1 (ggplot2 v.3.36, ggrepel v.0.9.0) to visualize data. We used StataMP v.17.0 (reghdfe v.5.7.3) to conduct statistical analyses.

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Acknowledgements

This study was supported by the National Science Foundation (grant Nos. 1829168, 1932596 and 1829302).

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R.J.F. and E.L. collaboratively contributed to the conception and design of the study. R.J.F. and M.P. collaboratively contributed to the acquisition, analysis and interpretation of the data. R.J.F. created software used in the study. R.J.F., E.L. and M.P. collaboratively drafted and revised the manuscript.

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Extended data figures and tables

Extended data fig. 1 distribution of cd 5 ..

This figure gives an overview of the distribution of CD 5 for papers (n = 24,659,076) and patents (n = 3,912,353). Panels a and c show counts of papers and patents over discrete intervals of CD 5 . Panels b and d show the distribution of CD 5 over time, within 10 (papers) and 5 (patents) year intervals, using letter-value plots. These plots are similar to boxplots, but generally provide more reliable summaries for large datasets. They are drawn by identifying the median of the underlying distribution and then recursively drawing boxes outward from there in either direction that encompass half of the remaining data.

Extended Data Fig. 2 CD index measured using alternative forward citation windows.

This figure evaluates the sensitivity of our results to the use of different forward citation windows when computing the CD index for papers (n = 24,659,076) and patents (n = 3,912,353). In the main text, the index is computed based on citations made to papers and patents and their backward references as of 5 years after the year of publication. a and c plot the CD index using a longer, 10 year forward window, for papers and patents, respectively. b and d plot the CD index using all forward citations made to sample papers and patents as of the year 2017. Shaded bands correspond to 95% confidence intervals. Overall, the results mirror those reported in the main text, although the decline is somewhat steeper using longer forward citation windows, suggesting our primary results may represent a more conservative estimate.

Extended Data Fig. 3 Diversity of language use in science and technology over time.

This figure shows changes in the ratio of unique to total words (also known as the type-token ratio) over time based on data from the abstracts of papers ( a , n = 76 WoS research area × year observations) and patents ( b , n = 229 NBER technology category × year observations). For papers, lines correspond to WoS research areas; for patents, lines correspond to NBER technology categories. For paper abstracts, lines begin in 1992 because WoS does not reliably record abstracts for papers published prior to the early 1990s. The ratio of unique to total words is computed separately by field (i.e., the uniqueness of words and total word counts are determined within WoS research areas and NBER technology categories). If disruption is decreasing, we may plausibly expect to see a decrease in the diversity of words used by scientists and inventors, as discoveries and inventions will be less likely to create departures from the status quo, and will therefore be less likely to need to introduce new terminology. For both papers and patents, we observe declining diversity in word use over time, which is consistent with this expectation and corroborates our findings using the CD index.

Extended Data Fig. 4 Declining combinatorial novelty.

This figure shows changing patterns in the combinatorial novelty/conventionality of papers ( a , n = 24,659,076) and patents ( b , n = 3,912,353), using a previously proposed measure of “atypical combinations” 14 . The measure quantifies the degree to which the prior work cited by a paper or patent would be expected by chance. For papers, we follow prior work 14 and consider combinations of cited journals. If a paper made three citations to prior work, and that work was published in three different journals— Nature , Cell , and Science —then there are three combinations— Nature × Cell , Nature × Science , and Science × Cell . To determine the degree to which each combination would be expected by chance, the frequency of observed pairings is compared to those in 10 “rewired” copies of the overall citation network, using a z-score. For patents, there is no natural analogue to journals, and therefore we consider pairings of primary United States Patent Classification (USPC) system codes. We present the results of this analysis following the approach of prior work 14 , which plots the cumulative distribution function of the measure. In general, there is a rightward shift in the cumulative distributions over time, suggesting that for both papers and patents, combinations are more conventional than would be expected by chance, consistent with what we would anticipate based on our results using the CD index. For patents, there is also a smaller shift in the opposite direction on the left side of the distribution, suggesting that novel patents in recent decades are somewhat more novel than novel patents in earlier decades. Overall, however, the bulk of the distribution is moving rightward, indicating greater conventionality.

Extended Data Fig. 5 Contribution of field, year, and author effects.

This figure shows the relative contribution of field, year, and author fixed effects to the adjusted R 2 in regression models predicting CD 5 . The top bar shows the results for papers (n = 80,607,091 paper × author observations); the bottom bar shows the results for patents (n = 8,319,826 patent × inventor observations). The results suggest that for both papers and patents, stable characteristics of authors contribute significantly to patterns of disruptiveness. Moreover, relatively little of the variation is accounted for by field-specific factors.

Extended Data Fig. 6 CD index over time across data sources.

This figure shows changes in CD 5 over time across four additional data sources (the WoS [n = 24,659,076] and Patents View [n = 3,912,353] lines are included for reference): JSTOR (n = 1,703,353), the American Physical Society corpus (n = 478,373), Microsoft Academic Graph (n = 1,000,000), and PubMed (n = 16,774,282). Colours indicate the six different data sources. Shaded bands correspond to 95% confidence intervals. The figure indicates that the decline in disruption is unlikely to be driven by our sample choice of WoS papers and Patents View patents.

Extended Data Fig. 7 Alternative measures of disruption.

This figure shows the decline in the disruption of papers ( a , n = 100,000) and patents ( b , n = 100,000) based on two alternative measures of disruption. The blue lines calculate disruption using a measure proposed in Bornmann et al. 13 , \({{DI}}_{l}^{{nok}}\) where l = 5, which makes the measure more resilient to marginal changes in the number of papers or patents that only cite the focal work’s references. The orange lines calculate disruption using a measure proposed in Leydesdorff et al. 15 , DI*, which makes the measure less sensitive to small changes in the forward citation patterns of papers or patents that make no backward citations. Shaded bands correspond to 95% confidence intervals. With both alternative measures, we observe decreases in disruption for papers and patents, suggesting that the decline is not an artefact of our operationalization of disruption.

Extended Data Fig. 8 Robustness to changes in publication, citation, and authorship practices.

This figure evaluates whether declines in disruptiveness may be attributable to changes in publication, citation, and authorship practices for papers (n = 24,659,076) and patents (n = 3,912,353). Panels a and d adjust for these changes using a normalization approach. We present two alternative versions of the CD index, both of which account for the tendency for papers and patents to cite more prior work over time. Blue lines indicate normalization at the paper level (accounting for the number of citations made by the focal paper/patent). Orange lines indicate normalization at the field and year level (accounting for the mean number of citations made by papers/patents in the focal field and year). Panels b (papers) and e (patents) adjust for changes in publication, citation, and authorship practices using a regression approach. The panels show predicted values of CD 5 based on regressions reported in Models 4 (papers) and 8 (patents) of Supplementary Table 1 , which adjust for field × year— Number of new papers/patents , Mean number of papers/patents cited , Mean number of authors/inventors per paper/patent —and paper/patent-level— Number of papers/patents cited , Number of unlinked references —characteristics. Predictions are made separately for each year indicator included in the models; we then connect these separate predictions with lines to aid interpretation. Finally, Panels c (papers) and f (patents) adjust for changes in publication, citation, and authorship practices using a simulation approach. The panels plot z-scores that compare values of CD 5 obtained from the observed citation networks to those obtained from randomly rewired copies of the observed networks. Across all six panels, shaded bands correspond to 95% confidence intervals.

Extended Data Fig. 9 Growth of scientific and technological knowledge.

This figure shows the number of papers (n = 24,659,076) published ( a ) and patents (n = 3,912,353) granted ( b ) over time. For papers, lines correspond to WoS research areas; for patents, lines correspond to NBER technology categories.

Supplementary information

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Supplementary Sections 1–3, Tables 1–3 and References.

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Park, M., Leahey, E. & Funk, R.J. Papers and patents are becoming less disruptive over time. Nature 613 , 138–144 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-022-05543-x

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Scientific or technical journal writers like scientists, doctors, engineers, and academics are usually introduced early to the importance and strategy of writing and publishing papers, but patent applications having those same professionals as inventors are usually not so well explained and can be more of a mystery.  What is a patent?  Clearly, we do not have to go far to find the definition.  A quick online search returns numerous pages explaining it to the world.  In the U.S., a patent is an intellectual property right 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” for a limited time in exchange for public disclosure of the invention when the patent is granted.  The same basic principles apply in Europe and most other places throughout the world.  This definition is familiar to a patent practitioner or any other patent savvy person.  But there are a lot of current and future inventors for whom the notion of a patent is not that intuitive.

During the  Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing  conference that one of the authors, Inna Dahlin, spoke at, a question of differences between a patent and a scientific or technical paper arose. To a patent practitioner, the two documents and their purposes are so different that any comparison can seem superfluous.  But the question was asked more than once, which gave pause for thought. There were a large number of attendees (over 8,000) who all were highly accomplished women – undergraduate and graduate students, and more senior professionals from industry and academics.  That numerous people who are interested and experienced in technology, and are passionate about research and their careers, had questions about patents versus papers helped shine a spotlight on differences between the two.

Although inventions can be described both in a paper and in an application for a patent, a patent application has particular timing requirements, gives the patent owner particular rights, and often has different goals.

First, throughout the world, with very limited exceptions in only certain countries, a patent application must be filed before any public disclosure of the invention is made or a valid patent can never be secured at all.  The subject matter of a paper, on the other hand, can be casually discussed and can be discussed online, at conferences, with friends, or in any number of other public ways without putting the existence of the paper in jeopardy.  Thus, consulting with your institution’s licensing office or legal staff is often a good first step before discussing any potentially patentable subject matter in any public, non-confidential way.

Second, unlike a paper, a patent is an asset, a property.  It is often compared to real estate where claims included in the patent define a scope of what is protected by the patent, similar to a fence around land.  That’s why the term “patent protection” is used, meaning that a patent protects your rights.  The patent can be sold, assigned, and used in a number of other ways to obtain value or competitive advantage in ways that a paper cannot.  Whoever owns a patent can sue those violating rights of the patent owner that are expressed in the claims of the patent.  A patent (particularly a collection of them, “a patent portfolio”) may be worth millions of dollars.  Thus, a patent gives its owner certain exclusive rights with respect to the invention, and it is at least potentially more powerful and more valuable monetarily than a paper.

Third, an idea worth patenting should be novel, useful, and non-obvious.  After a patent application is filed in the U.S., Europe, or another country, it undergoes an examination process that can last anywhere from two to seven years, and sometimes longer.  While experts on a peer-review board can catch that a submitted manuscript pertains to something that has already been done by others, there is no strict requirement that a publication describes something inventive.  A patent application, however, is examined to determine whether there is any “prior art”, such as prior patents, publications, and other evidence demonstrating that the claimed subject matter has already been publicly disclosed.   In other words, a more rigorous standard is applied to patent applications than to manuscripts.

Fourth, there are specific requirements for writing a patent application.  Sometimes inventors say that a patent application includes language that they would not naturally use.  However, this “legalese” language is often needed to describe the invention completely so it can be implemented by someone else and to set out the scope of the invention in broad, conceptual terms to help define the protection afforded by the patent.  Focusing only on minute details that are so dear to researchers and developers could overly limit the patent.  Needlessly detailed claims and description may result in a narrow patent protecting only a particular way of implementing the invention so that it is relatively easy for others (e.g., competitors!) to implement the inventive concept in a different way to circumvent the patent.  A patent practitioner’s job is to ensure that the patent application is as complete and broad as possible and that inventors understand what is being described and claimed.  Depending on the nature of the invention, there may also be special requirements for the type and amount of supporting data that should be included in a patent, which may be rather different from the kind of data that should be included in a paper or its online supplements.  While the inventor is an expert in the technology, the patent practitioner puts the invention in the proper form.

In summary, while deserved respect and recognition can be earned from technical communities by publishing in a highly regarded journal, being named an inventor opens different horizons and can offer different valuable benefits.  Understanding key differences between papers and patents can help make traveling down both these roads easier and more effective for everyone involved.

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February 1, 2019 |

Mind the gap: Spanning the divide between patents and journal articles

With traditional funding sources becoming limited, academic institutions and commercial entities are increasingly partnering on research and development . As a result, there is more pressure to monetize intellectual property and publish research across multiple channels. Not only are academic institutions publishing findings in top journals, but their commercial partners are also securing patents in countries where inventions could potentially be brought to market.

This means that journals are no longer the first point of access for the latest academic research. Rather, new findings are now, first and foremost, found in patents—which typically must be filed before other public disclosures of the research. However, patents are generally more difficult to locate and understand, creating a blind spot for those seeking to assess the research landscape.

Overcoming the search gap between patents and journal articles

In terms of content and searchability, journal articles and patents couldn't be more different. The goal of a journal article is to communicate knowledge and encourage other researchers and publications to cite it. As such, journal articles are composed to draw in readers with compelling headlines, meaningful abstracts and thorough examples that convey the purpose and impact of the research. These specific details make journal articles somewhat easy to find through search.

Conversely, patents often withhold key details to protect the origins, conditions and commercial potential of the research. Though patent offices have rules to ensure titles and abstracts are clear, skilled patent attorneys will describe the invention in a way that provides the broadest protection possible with the least amount of disclosure. While valuable from a legal perspective, patents can prove troublesome from a search perspective. Further, patents are published in multiple languages, further complicating access to this information.

These challenges make it difficult for even the most skilled researcher to find the information they need from patents. And given that patents are normally the first publication to disclose new compounds and concepts, their low searchability is a real hindrance to innovators who depend on timely access to the latest global scientific information.

Using specialized tools to help close the gap

Closing the search gap requires specialized tools because an ordinary search engine isn't able to capture and curate complex scientific information. For example, consider two publications about hyaluronan hydrogels—a patent ( WO2017191276 ) and a journal article . Both are by the same author, but have very different titles and abstracts. The abstract for the patent contains chemical structures, which are nearly impossible for non-specialized search engines to track.

The journal article abstract in  ACS Biomaterials Science & Engineering   is written quite differently:

In this study, transglutaminase-cross-linked hyaluronan (HA-TG) hydrogels are investigated for their potential to treat cartilage lesions. We show the hydrogels fulfill key requirements: they are simultaneously injectable, fast-gelling, biocompatible with encapsulated cells, mitogenic, chondroinductive, and form a stable and strongly adhesive bond to native cartilage. Human chondroprogenitors encapsulated in HA-TG gels simultaneously show good growth and chondrogenesis...

A search for the terms, "transglutaminase" and "hyaluronan hydrogels," in  Google Scholar yields 3,750 answers. While the journal article is the third answer on page one, the patent doesn't show up in the first 10 pages of results. Conducting the same search in SciFinder n from CAS produces six results, including the journal article and patent. It also becomes clear that the journal article and patent share several indexed substances. There are 10 indexed for the journal article and 48 for the patent, with 6 substances appearing in both.

This precise, effective search is possible thanks to a unique combination of specialized technology and the expertise of CAS scientists , who comb through the ever-growing volume of published scientific content and apply meaningful categorizations to improve searchability and ensure results are as exact as possible.

In SciFinder n , journals and patents are thoroughly analyzed and titles and abstracts are rewritten, as needed, to provide more useful information than what was in the original versions. In fact, 95 percent of patent titles and abstracts are rewritten by CAS to ensure a better search experience. Relevant concepts, claims, chemical structures, examples and CAS Registry Numbers ® are also disclosed. In addition, patent documents from any of the 63 global patent offices are in SciFinder n with English translations of the title and abstract. By overcoming language barriers that often prove prohibitive when searching patents, researchers using SciFinder n can easily monitor and access discoveries made worldwide.

There's no doubt that the differences between journal articles and patents are extensive and impact how they can be searched. Tools that provide a unified approach to curating journals articles and patents are key to overcoming the search gap and driving innovation forward.

Want to improve your ability to quickly and easily find scientific information? Learn more about how CAS solutions can help accelerate innovation .

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Basics of scientific and technical writing: Patents

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The basics on patents

A patent is a form of intellectual property (IP) that gives the right to the inventors to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention for a certain period of time (usually 20 years). The inventors should publish a public disclosure of the invention in return. For the inventors, however, a patent does not automatically give the right to make, use, or sell an invention. Patents are considered private law, which means if someone violates the patent law and uses the idea for commercial purposes during the term of the patent, the inventor can sue them to enforce the law.

Patentability criteria

There are three main criteria to ensure an idea is patentable: novelty, usefulness (or utility), and non-obviousness. The first major criteria of patentability is novelty, which means that the idea is not publicly known before the filing date of the patent or before any priority date of the patent. This is to avoid the patenting of prior ideas. According to the second criteria (utility), an invention needs to be useful to ensure its patentability. Utility here means the invention should provide clear benefits and should be capable of use. This may differ with various countries (e.g., European patent law and US patent law have different rules). Non-obviousness, which is a general requirement of most patent laws, means that the invention or the idea of the invention should be sufficiently beyond or above the current state of the art. For example, if a patent is filed on a method with a certain material, one may not be able to patent the same method with another material if these two materials are known to be used interchangeably.

Types of patents

Different types of patents include utility, design, and plants. Each patent type has its own eligibility requirements and is useful for a certain type of invention. One patent can have more than one suitability. For example, if we need to patent a device and reserve its right for both functionality and design, two separate patents can be filed. Utility applications are the most common and normally cover processes, materials, and devices with functions that are new and useful. Design applications normally cover the shape and configuration of an object (e.g., the exterior shape of a car, cell phone, or laptop). Finally, plant patents are to protect new and distinctive plants.

Applications

A patent application is submitted to a patent office with detailed aspects of the invention described in the specifications along with a set of claims stated in the formal document. Once the specifications are approved, a patent is granted.

A provisional application places an application on file for one year to secure a priority date, but without the complexity and expense of a standard application. After the one-year period, one can file a non-provisional standard patent application, while reserving the priority date of the provisional application. Depending on the outcome of the patent office examination, the patent may be granted. One can also file a continuation application, under certain circumstances, to include materials from an earlier application when the priority year has expired.

A patent filed in the United States is submitted to the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) is an office for international applications. A US patent (from USPTO) does not guarantee international protection of your IP, but, a world patent can cover several countries.

Patent structures

A patent application generally consists of (1) a patent summary, (2) patent specifications, (3) list of claims (independent and dependent), (4) drawings and descriptions, (5) references, and (6) signed Proper IP Disclosure and Declaration forms. The patent summary should provide an overview of the idea and what is to be disclosed in the patent. The main body of the patent specifications should provide details of the background, state-of-the-art features (may also include a summary of prior art search results), and descriptions of the invention, drawings, and figures. Independent claims provide an overview of the invention. Dependent claims provide details and variations of the invention. For a utility application, the claims can be either method- or device-based. Method claims are those that describe novel methods presented in the patent, while device claims are for claiming inventive devices; these claims can be separate. Drawings are in black and white, unlike figures in papers, which tend to vary in color. Other textures or pattern fills, such as shades, diagonal lines, and dashes, can be used in the schematics/figures/drawings, or each section of the figures can be numbered followed by proper descriptions. Similar to papers, patents also contain a reference section to cite prior art (e.g., patents, papers) and relevant works in the specifications. Proper IP Disclosure and Declaration forms should be submitted by each inventor.

Steps to file a patent

The figure shows a standard process flow for a patent, from idea to filing to granting. Assuming an idea is developed, the first step is to secure it. One approach is to write it down on a piece of paper, and sign and date it (this will help when you want to claim an earlier priority date in your application), or save an email sent to your co-inventors or to yourself describing the idea.

The second step is to verify whether the idea is patentable; check its novelty, utility, and non-obviousness. Particularly for novelty, perform a prior art search, including previously published patents, papers, or any other relevant documents.

Then, secure a patent type and write a summary document, which describes the field of invention, description of the prior art, invention specifications, details of the idea with figures and any simulation or experimental data, references, and tentative claims (independent and dependent, method, or device claims). The tentative claims will help the patent office to write proper final claims according to your invention. A good patent application requires illustrative drawings with proper descriptions. Most institutes have illustrators to prepare the drawings, but they will need a base figure and several iterations to achieve a decent, comprehensive drawing for the invention.

The specification document, along with any other supporting documents (e.g., relevant paper publications, thesis), should be sent to the patent office at your institution, along with signed IP disclosure forms, including the patent intellectual contribution shares for each inventor. The inventors should also mention the stage of the idea—whether it is at the concept level or if it has been fully/partially reduced to practice. The inventors should also mention whether the idea is developed or fully/partially reduced-to-practice as a result of any governmental or industrial funding source.

The patent office will conduct a patentability check to determine if it is interested in pursuing the patent. It also check the priority date to ensure there is no significant public disclosure (e.g., publications, presentations, reports). A patent may be rejected if it was disclosed to the public before a provisional or non-provisional patent is filed.

For a provisional application during the one-year period, inventors will have time to further reduce the invention to practice. The patent office will also conduct a systematic search for any industry interest in the invention. After the one-year period for provisional applications, depending on the decision of the institute, they will decide whether to re-file or file for a non-provisional application or to abandon the application. After a non-provisional application is filed, USPTO or WIPO examines the application. Upon approval from another novelty and non-obviousness check with the prior art, a patent with the inventive concepts disclosed is granted and will be approved for public disclosure.

To do or not to do, that is the question

■ Do not pursue a patent for every idea. Select those that have clear industrial applications and can be reduced to practice reasonably quick.

■ Only spend time on ideas that are worth patenting. Conduct a novelty search first.

■ Reduce your invention to practice. Gather any experimental/theoretical data that support the invention.

■ Use proper communication tools when discussing your idea with the patent office. Avoid any immature or false claims that could negatively affect your patent application.

■ Make illustrative but color-independent drawings. Drawings for patents are typically in black and white. They need proper textures/pattern fills and descriptions to replace the color-coding normally used for standard paper figures.

■ Add detailed variations to the idea description, and make drawings that cover all aspects of the invention.

■ Improvise. With patents, details and variations are encouraged, as long as they are within the scope of the invention. The patent office will decide whether to split the idea into separate patents.

■ Enjoy your idea developments!

Author information

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Materials Department, and Solid State Lighting & Energy Electronics Center, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, USA

Morteza Monavarian

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This article is the second in a three-part series in MRS Bulletin that will focus on writing papers, patents, and proposals.

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Monavarian, M. Basics of scientific and technical writing: Patents. MRS Bulletin 46 , 354–355 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1557/s43577-021-00091-7

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Published : 25 March 2021

Issue Date : April 2021

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1557/s43577-021-00091-7

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Patent process overview

A step-by-step overview of a patent application and maintenance process.

Step 1: Get ready to apply

Contact Patents Contact information for USPTO resources accessible at all stages of the patent process.

Filing a patent application on your own Provides outreach and education for independent inventors who file patent applications without the assistance of a registered patent attorney or agent.

Public Search Facility Located in Alexandria, VA with trained staff to assist the public in person, via email, and by phone with patent and trademark information and historical collections.

Patent Pro Bono Program: Free patent legal assistance The program provides free legal assistance to under-resourced inventors interested in securing patent protection for their inventions.

Law School Clinic Certification Program Free legal help provided by law students, who gain experience drafting and filing patents and trademark applications for clients of the law school clinic.

Inventors Assistance Center Provides patent information and services to the public. Staffed with experienced examiners who answer general questions about patent examining policy and procedures.

Receipts Accounting Division (RAD) For information on fee payments, including maintenance fees, deposit accounts, and refund requests.

Access our free services The USPTO offers a wide range of resources, services, and training programs that support the full spectrum of customers in both the private and public sectors.

Small and medium-sized enterprise resources A specialized list of resources for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), independent inventors, and entrepreneurs looking to grow a business and protect intangible business assets like IP.

Startup resources A hub for startup resources to help you address the intellectual property (IP) challenges specific to startups, including securing funding and guarding against costly infringement litigation.

A. Determine the type of intellectual property (IP) protection you need

To protect your invention, you may need a patent, trademark, copyright, trade secret, or some combination of these. Before you begin preparing a patent application, find out if you really need a patent and not some other form of IP protection.

• Do I need a patent, a trademark, or a copyright?
• IP Identifier tool

B. Determine if your invention is patentable

To find out if you can patent your invention, you need to know the answers to a few questions:

• Who can apply for a patent?
• What can and cannot be patented?
• How do I know if my invention is patentable?
• How much does it cost in USPTO fees to get a patent?

Find answers to other questions on our  Patent FAQs page .

C. Search to see if your invention has already been publicly disclosed by another party

Normally you cannot get a patent if your invention has already been publicly disclosed prior to filing a patent application for your invention. Therefore, a search of all previous public disclosures should be conducted, including a search of foreign patents and printed publications. A public disclosure of the invention made by, or that originated from, the inventor or a joint inventor more than one year prior to filing a patent application for the invention will also preclude patenting.

We encourage novices to contact the nearest Patent and Trademark Resource Center (PTRC) for help from search experts in setting a search strategy. A registered patent attorney or agent, or a patent search firm is often a useful resource.

It is possible, though challenging, to conduct your own preliminary search. Your search may not be as complete as one made by the USPTO when examining an application. For this reason, the patent examiner may, and often does, reject claims in an application on the basis of prior patents or publications not found in your preliminary search.

These sources provide tips on how to conduct your own search:

• Basics of prior art searching  – provides an overview for the need to conduct a prior art search and identify pertinent prior art, with examples of publicly available prior art databases.
• How to conduct a preliminary U.S. patent search: A step-by-step strategy  – provides a web-based video tutorial (36 minutes).
• The Multi-Step Patent Search Strategy  – outlines a suggested procedure for patent searches.
• Cooperative Patent Classification effort and the United States Patent Classification system  – shows how patent documents are organized in the classification system, which can help you with your search.

Current patents and many filed patent applications (referred to as “pre-grant publications”) may be searched using the   Patent Public Search tool . (Please note that filed applications for design patents will not have a pre-grant publication). See our  Patent Search page  for additional resources.

Once your search has been completed, you may find that your invention may not be identically disclosed in the prior art (i.e. your invention is novel). This does not guarantee patentability. Once assigned, an examiner will conduct their own prior art search as part of the examination process. 

D. What kind of patent do you need? 

Utility patent (nonprovisional).

This is by far the most common type of application submitted to the USPTO. This may be granted to anyone who invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, article of manufacture, or composition of matter, or a new and useful improvement of any of these.

• Nonprovisional (Utility) Patent Application Guide
• Biotechnical sequence listing  validation  and  authoring  tools
• Business method patent information

Design patent (nonprovisional)

This may be granted to anyone who invents a new, original, and ornamental design for an article of manufacture.

• Definition of a design patent
• Difference between design and utility patents
• How long does patent protection last for a design patent?
• Design Patent Application Guide

Plant patent (nonprovisional)

These may be granted to anyone who invents or discovers and asexually reproduces any distinct and new variety of plant.

• Introduction to plant patents
• Plant Patent Application Guide

E. How much is this going to cost?

A patent application is subject to the payment of a basic filing fee, a search fee, and an examination fee, which are due when the application is filed. Excess claims fees and/or an application size fee may also be due on filing depending on the number of claims and the total number of pages in the specification and drawings.

Fees vary depending on the type of patent application that you submit and if you qualify for fee discounts.

Filing, search, and examination fees

• Check the current fee schedule before submitting your application and any required fees.
• For information on fees under the America Invents Act (AIA) and for prioritized examination, go to our AIA FAQ page and filter on "fees."

The payment of these initial fees does not guarantee you will receive a patent. These fees enable the USPTO to examine your application. Discounts are available if you  meet the requirements for small entity or micro-entity status .

F. Do you need international protection?

The Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) is an international treaty with more than 150 contracting states. The PCT makes it possible to seek patent protection for an invention simultaneously in a large number of countries by first filing a single “international” patent application and then pursuing patent rights in countries of interest under separate national procedures for granting of patents instead of filing several separate national or regional patent applications. The granting of patents based on an international application filing under the PCT remains under the control of the national or regional patent offices in what is called the “national phase.”

• Intellectual Property (IP) Attaché Program
• International Patent Legal Administration (formerly PCT Legal Administration)  
• Pursuing international IP protection

G. Determine whether you should hire a patent attorney or agent

Preparing a patent application and engaging in the USPTO proceedings to obtain the patent requires knowledge of patent law and USPTO procedures. It also requires knowledge of the scientific or technical matters involved in the particular invention.

You may prepare and file your own application with the USPTO as a “pro se” applicant. Don’t be intimidated by the Latin term “pro se.” It can be translated to "for oneself, on one's own behalf." Legally, when you, an independent inventor, decide to file your application by yourself, you become what we at the USPTO call a pro se applicant. 

• Visit the Pro Se Assistance Program webpage for more information.
• Pro se knowledge pack  [PDF]

When you file as a pro se applicant, you conduct the proceedings with the examiner yourself, but unless you are familiar with these or study them in detail, you may encounter considerable difficulty. While some people not skilled in this area may obtain a patent, there’s no assurance that the patent obtained would adequately protect the invention.

Therefore, most inventors hire registered patent attorneys or agents. They can help you navigate the remaining steps as they act on your behalf. The first step is to contact a registered patent attorney or agent who is accepting new customers. The USPTO cannot aid in the selection or recommendation of an attorney or agent but provides a  searchable directory  of such individuals you can contact directly.  Additional information on attorneys and agents  is also available.

Are you an inventor or small business owner with limited resources and needing help applying for a patent? If so, you may be eligible to receive pro bono (free) attorney representation through either the  Law School Clinic Program  or the  Patent Pro Bono Program.  Additionally, the USPTO maintains several other  legal assistance resources and programs  for independent inventors, entrepreneurs, and small businesses. 

It is possible, though challenging, to file a patent application on your own. The remaining steps will guide you through the filing process.

Step 2: File your application

Patent Center Filing and application management incorporated within a single user interface for enhanced user experience.

Patent Electronic Business Center Assists customers with filing and review of electronic patent application submissions via Patent Center.

Forms for patent applications Due to the enactment of the America Invents Act in 2012, this page contains forms for patent applications filed on or after September 16, 2012.

Application Assistance Unit Staff are trained to answer questions about the pre- and post-examination processing of patent applications.

Patent Cooperation Treaty This international treaty makes it possible to seek patent protection simultaneously in a large number of countries by filing a single international application.

If you have employed a registered attorney or agent, they can file on your behalf.

If planning on filing your application yourself, see the  Patent Application Guides  for information on the required parts, form, and content of a patent application (MPEP § 600) for filing the type of patent application you have determined is right for you.

If you are an independent inventor, contact our  Pro Se Assistance Program . It offers free assistance if you choose to not hire a patent attorney or patent agent. The Pro Se Assistance home page provides a number of resources for independent inventors throughout the patent process.

A. Create and validate your USPTO.gov account

The USPTO strongly recommends applicants register for a USPTO.gov account in order to make the most of our systems. Registration allows users of the USPTO’s Electronic Filing System Patent Center the ability to electronically save materials being created for submission and to file follow-on materials online. While it is possible to file a patent application online as an unregistered user without a customer number, you will not benefit from the USPTO tools available online to view and track your submission if you do so. In order to track the progress of your application and respond to USPTO correspondence online, you must become a registered user by obtaining a customer number and verified USPTO.gov account. We highly encourage you to register in order to make the most of our systems.

Getting started as a registered e-Filer

Your application does not have to be ready to open your verified USPTO.gov account. Start this process as early as possible so that when you are ready, you can file your application as a registered user. Find more information regarding the account creation process at the  Patent Electronic Business Center (EBC) .

An additional non-electronic filing fee applies to file by postal mail or hand-delivery when filing a non-provisional utility application. The non-electronic filing fee does not apply to design, plant, or provisional applications.  Find out more about filing your application this way .

B. Prepare your application

See the  Patent Application Guides  for the detailed legal requirements for filing the type of patent application you have determined is right for you.

Do you want to file a provisional or nonprovisional application?

Provisional application A provisional application is a quick, inexpensive way for you to establish a U.S. filing date for your invention that can be claimed in a later-filed U.S. nonprovisional, PCT, and/or foreign application. Provisional applications will not be examined and never lead to patents by themselves. After filing a provisional application, you will have 12 months from the provisional filing date to file your U.S. nonprovisional, PCT, and/or foreign application. Please note that provisional applications cannot be filed for design inventions.

Basics of Filing a Provisional Application 

Nonprovisional application A nonprovisional application is examined by a patent examiner and may be issued as a patent if all the requirements for patentability are met. To file your nonprovisional application, you must prepare all your documentation. This includes submitting the contents in a standardized format, along with all required forms and fees. Consult this  checklist for filing a nonprovisional utility patent application  [PDF] for more information regarding the required forms and content.

If filing a nonprovisional application claiming the benefit of the filing date of a provisional application, your nonprovisional must properly refer to the application number of your prior-filed provisional in an Application Data Sheet (ADS) for your claimed invention to be eligible to receive the benefit of the provisional filing date. Here are tips for filling out your Application Data Sheet [PDF].

C. Submit your application

Submit your initial application with all the required parts for obtaining a filing date and include the correct fee. Here are some elements to consider:

• Checklist for filing a nonprovisional utility patent application  [PDF]
• Parts, Form, and Content of Application (MPEP § 601)
• Patent application filing fees
• Accepted payment methods
• Common pitfalls on USPTO forms
• Small-entity and micro-entity status information
• Inventor Info Chat Claim Drafting presentation (Video) 
• Additional guidance regarding Signatures 
•   Petitions to make special – applicant’s age or health   

Online submission

Once your documentation is ready, submit your application online by logging in to  Patent Center  through your validated USPTO.gov account. Filing online provides a better guided filing experience and avoids additional paper-filing fees. Here are some resources to help you:

• How to access our online filing and application status systems
• Filing documents during an outage
• Additional help; first-time online filers may also contact the  Patents Electronic Business Center  for assistance in the online filing process

As a part of our continuous efforts to modernize and streamline our patent application systems, applicants have the ability to file patent application-related documents in DOCX format through Patent Center. Patent Center registered and unregistered users may file the specification, claims, abstract and drawings in DOCX format. Specification, claims and abstracts not filed in DOCX format will incur a non-DOCX surcharge of up to $400 for this filing type, effective January 17, 2024.

• File patent application documents in DOCX
• Top three helpful tips for filing patent applications as you move to DOCX format

When you submit your documentation, be sure to include:

• DOCX Specification Template  [DOCX] — a simplified template for new filings with the most common specification sections. In Patent Center this template will autodetect the Specification, Claims, Abstract, and Drawings sections.
• Claim drafting assistance  [PDF] — a presentation on claim format and drafting strategy. (Fees mentioned are subject to change).
• An abstract (about 150 words or less) on a separate sheet
• Drawings (if needed)
• Fees (filing, search, and examination), plus any other required fees
• Oath or declaration signed by all inventors (if more than one inventor, submit more than one form) Oath or Declaration examples
• Video Guidance for filling out the Micro Entity Status Form (PTO/SB/15A)
• Understanding the Application Data Sheet (ADS)  [PDF] — a presentation on information and tips for filing an ADS
• See  Checklist for filing a nonprovisional utility patent application  [PDF] for additional information.

Before you sign your application, carefully review the written specification and claims. You will not be able to add any new information to your application after it is filed.

D. Pre-prosecution

Once your application has been received by the USPTO, it will then be reviewed for formalities and completeness. If your application contains informalities or is incomplete, you will receive a notice outlining the requirements to complete your application (e.g. Notice to File Missing Parts or Notice of Incomplete Application).

A Notice to File Missing Parts will be sent to you in the event that an essential filing requirement is found to be missing when your application is filed. Some examples of essential filing requirements are: appropriate filing fees, improper entity status, and improper priority claims.

A Notice of Incomplete Application is sent to you when nonprovisional application papers are deemed incomplete. Essential filing papers are the specification, drawings, and claims. The filing date of the application will be the date the corrections are made. More information on application completeness can be found in the Manual of Patent Examining Procedure (MPEP) § 506. You will be given a time period to complete the application filing (a surcharge may be required). Timely response to correspondence from us and keeping your contact information up to date is important so you won’t miss important correspondence. If the omission is not corrected within the specified time period, the application will be abandoned.

If your application becomes abandoned at this stage and you still want to pursue this patent, you may be able to revive your application or request withdrawal of the abandonment by filing a petition (fees, forms and requirements vary). The type of petition needed depends on the circumstances surrounding the abandonment of your application.

If you filed a non-provisional application and no outstanding matters remain on perfecting your application, then your application will be routed to a patent examiner who will determine patentability.

E. How long will this take?

You can check the status of your patent application and review the file history in Patent Center . You can search by application number, patent number, PCT number, publication number or international design registration number.

• Check the First Office Action Estimator for an estimate of how long until you receive your first letter from USPTO in response to your application. 
• See the Patents Data Visualization Center for an average first office action time estimate and total pendency. This will be available once the application has been classified.

Consider expedited examination options. The USPTO Patent Application Initiatives Timeline displays various programs to help you during each phase of the patent process. View a detailed list of programs available prior to examination .

Step 3: Application prosecution

Patents Ombuds Office Provides assistance for patent applications that may appear to be stalled in the patent examination process and can assist with getting applications back on track.

Patent petitions If you want us to take certain action in your patent or patent application, you may need to file a petition. Learn all about petitions here, including which type you may need, ways to file them, and how they are decided.

New to PTAB? Independent inventors, new practitioners, and others can explore the links below to better understand the Patent Trial and Appeal Board's (PTAB) role during and after the patenting process.

If you choose legal representation, remember that once an application is filed by a patent attorney or agent, the USPTO will only communicate with the attorney or agent. The USPTO does not simultaneously correspond with you and a legal representative ( 37 CFR 1.33 ).

The work of examining patent applications is divided among various technology centers (TCs), each overseeing assigned fields of technology. Each TC is headed by group directors and staffed by examiners and support staff. The examiners are assigned to units specializing in the broad and specific subject areas that best cover your invention and review applications and determine whether patents can be granted.

Once your application has been assigned for examination, your examiner will review the contents of your application to determine if it meets all legal requirements for a patent to be granted. The examination consists of a study for compliance with legal requirements (e.g. utility, double patenting, non-statutory double patenting) and a search through U.S. patents, publications of patent applications, foreign patent documents, and available literature. This is to see if the claimed invention is new, useful, and non-obvious, and if the application meets patent statute requirements and rules of practice.

You are notified in writing of the examiner’s decision by an “office action.” This is normally mailed to the attorney or agent of record, or to you directly if not represented by an attorney or agent. There are a number of legal requirements that must be met, including novelty (35 U.S.C. 102), utility and eligibility (35 U.S.C 101), non-obviousness (35 U.S.C. 103), and written description (35 U.S.C. 112), etc. If the examiner determines the application does not meet all of the requirements, the reasons for the determination will be explained in this written office action.

You must request reconsideration in writing, distinctly and specifically pointing out the supposed errors in the office action, and replying to every ground of objection and rejection. The reply must appear throughout to be a bona fide attempt to advance the case to final action or allowance. The mere allegation that the examiner has erred is not a proper reason for reconsideration. You are able to amend your disclosure and/or argue against the examiner's decision at no cost (as long as the response is received within the time period noted in the action). In amending an application in reply to a rejection, you must clearly point out why you think the amended claims are patentable in view of the state of the art disclosed by the prior references cited or the rejections and objections made. You must also show how the claims as amended avoid such references, or rejections and objections.

Be careful to not delay your reply to office action, as this may result in additional fees if filed after the reply period expires or abandonment of your application if you fail to respond to the examiner's office action within the required time. Fees paid are rarely refundable. The reply period is noted in the action. The "shortened statutory" reply period is the time limit to reply without having to pay extension fees.

• Learn more about responding to office actions.
• Patent fees for "Extension of Time"  
• Understanding Prior Art Rejections Slides
• Understanding Prior Art Rejections Video

Consider an “interview” with your examiner  — We encourage our examiners to be proactive in engaging applicants in resolving issues and shortening prosecution. When you receive a non-final (or any other) office action, you may contact your examiner to schedule a meeting or phone call (what the USPTO refers to as an “interview”). The examiner’s contact information and work schedule can be found at the end of every office action. 

After you respond to the first office action, your examiner will review your response, and if the examiner still does not think your application meets the legal requirements for a patent, the examiner will explain the reason(s) in a written second office action. This second action may be indicated as “final”. You will still be able to amend or argue against the examiner's decision within time periods noted in the final action, but with more restrictions than when responding to a first office action.

After an office action is indicated as final, you still have multiple options, the most common of which are as follows:

• Filing a reply after final under 37 CFR 1.116 or under the After Final Consideration Pilot 2.0 that addresses all rejections and objections
• Filing a Request for Continued Examination (RCE) in order to continue prosecution of your application
• Filing a Notice of Appeal with the  Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB)

A detailed  matrix of programs available to assist you during examination  and after final rejection ( close of prosecution ) is available. Each program is designed to advance the progress of a patent application and to provide applicant assistance.

Note that unless the examiner reopens prosecution, applicant successfully removes all grounds of rejection, otherwise places the application in condition for allowance, or applicant otherwise stops the running of the statutory period for response, the application will go abandoned as a matter of law after six months from the mailing of the final rejection. See MPEP § 711.

• Instructions for responding to a Notice of Abandonment
• Electronic Communication Authorization

Step 4: Receive your patent

If the examiner determines that your application meets the patent requirements, you or your legal representative will receive a Notice of Allowance and Fee(s) Due. This means you are entitled to a patent. This will list the  issue fee and may also include the publication fee . You can find frequently asked questions about the notice and the issue fee here , along with the  patent fee table . 

The issue fee (and, if necessary, the publication fee) shown on the Notice of Allowance and Fee(s) Due must be paid for your patent to be issued. This payment must be received by the USPTO within 3 months from the date of mailing of the Notice of Allowance and Fee(s) Due to avoid abandonment of the application. Unlike many other deadlines during examination, this three-month period is not extendable.

The issue fee (and, if necessary, the publication fee) shown on the Notice of Allowance and Fee(s) Due must be paid for your patent to be issued. This payment must be received by the USPTO within three months from the date of mailing of the Notice of Allowance and Fee(s) Due to avoid abandonment of the application. Unlike many other deadlines during examination, this three-month period is not extendable.

The patent grant confers “the right 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." The term of a utility or plant patent generally lasts 20 years from the date the application was filed in the United States, subject to the payment of maintenance fees and any patent term extension, adjustment, or disclaimer. If the application claims the benefit of an earlier filed U.S. application or applications (excluding provisional applications), the patent term ends 20 years from the date the earliest such application was filed.

If you have additional inventions disclosed in your application or you have improvements to your current invention that were not previously disclosed, you may also choose to file additional applications ( Divisional , Continuation , or Continuation-In-Part ) to pursue patent protection for this subject matter. Any of these additional applications must be filed before the patent granted from your current application is issued, or you won't be able to claim priority back to the current application - that is, you must maintain copendency of the current and additional applications.  The additional application must be filed prior to, or concurrent with, the payment of the issue fee of the current ("parent") application, in order to not jeopardize the additional application’s copendency.

The USPTO is issuing electronic patent grants ( eGrants ) for all patents with an issue date on or after April 18, 2023. eGrants are available through Patent Center , the USPTO's electronic patent application filing and management system, which includes patent document viewing.

Step 5: Maintain legal protection for your invention

Pay your maintenance fees The USPTO’s Patent Maintenance Fees Storefront

Patent term calculator Estimate how long before your patent expires using this Microsoft Excel worksheet.

Pay maintenance fees and check the status

For utility patents, maintenance fees are due  3.5, 7.5, and 11.5 years after the date of the patent grant, and each one of those three maintenance fees can be paid without an additional surcharge during the six months preceding those due dates. Maintenance fees can also be paid with a surcharge during the six months following those due dates. Of course, the six months following the 3.5, 7.5, and 11.5 year due dates end on the 4th, 8th, and 12th anniversary dates of the patent grant and those three anniversary dates are the last days to pay the three respective maintenance fees in order to prevent patent expiration. Many patentees set up reminders to pay these fees and to check the  current fee schedule  before submitting any required fees. Failure to pay the maintenance fees leads to expiration of the patent and loss of the accompanying rights. See the  Maintain Your Patent  page for more information.

The USPTO does not mail notices that maintenance fees are due. If, however, a maintenance fee is not paid on time, the USPTO may send a reminder of the ability to pay with a surcharge during the grace period. If the fee is not paid on time, and the fee and surcharge are not paid during the grace period, the patent expires on the date the grace period ends.

After your patent is issued and published

• Record a change of ownership  of a patent (“Assignments”)
• Corrections to patents and published applications, revival of Abandonments, Withdrawal of Grants, and more
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India: Patent vs Research Paper Publication

Securing a patent bars others from making, using, or selling your intellectual property without your consent. Patents can be awarded to a process, an apparatus, a new use of an existing material, or an improvement on an existing technology, as long as it can be demonstrated to be new, useful, and not obvious to the person skilled in the field as per the Indian Patent law.

However, filing a patent can be a complex legal process. The Indian Patent Office, along with the patent attorney and agents, can help you navigate the legal requirements to determine whether your invention is patentable. After filing a patent application, it can take a significant amount of time for the patent to be granted or denied by the Indian Patent Office.

Most of the theoretical models of Research and Development (R&D) assume that the successful innovator will patent their invention but in practice this is not the case. Researchers/innovators often find it preferable to publish their inventions or the research paper and exclude the possibility of patenting even without actually going to the effort of obtaining a patent.

Public disclosure

Publishing the research or publicly disclosing it before filing a patent application can severely limit its patentability and can completely bar the invention from receiving an Indian or foreign patent. However, seeking a patent first does not preclude publication of research results, and, in most cases to retain the potential for foreign patents, an Indian patent application must be filed before any description of the invention is published in an article, abstract, thesis, presentation, or other public format to refrain it from going "in the public domain".

Why researchers prefer Publication over Patent?

There are several reasons due to which Indian researchers prefer article publication over patent. One can be a lack of awareness about the procedure of patent. Generally, publishing a research paper is more emphasized in most Indian universities and research institutes as research publication gives more visibility to the researcher among academic fraternity. The patent on the other hand is a time consuming process as compared to the publication.

• In India the patent right is not a big enough carrot to lure the researcher into filing a patent application. The reasons maybe that the research subject has no commercial value, maybe the cost to commercialize the technology is too big a hurdle for the researcher to scale or maybe the Patents Act in India provides too little protection for patents.
• The economic costs (legal fees, etc.) of going through the act of obtaining a patent may, for small innovations, exceed the actual benefits of getting a patent.
• The university or research institution where the researchers work do not have licensing department or IP cell to recoup the value of IP rights for the new inventions or the research work. A researcher needs professional help when deciding whether to file a patent application for his/her new discoveries. And, even if the researcher is awarded a patent, he/she may have trouble selling the patent right.
• Since, no extra bonus is provided for a patent application when compared to a paper, most researchers would choose publishing a paper. Writing a patent is different from writing a paper, also paper is relatively quicker to publish and easier to write (no claims at all).

However, a patent followed by a good publication is not a bad idea wherever it is applicable, as you may get royalty for your work if there are people ready to use it in future and peer recognition is an added benefit.

But the most important thing is, before starting your research you should decide first whether you look for good publication or patent because both things are different. For procuring a good publication the researcher requires a good theoretical concept but, for a patent the researcher needs to show novelty, inventive step and utility too. For patent you also need to find out current public demand along with its IP valuation.

There is a need to increase the awareness regarding the importance of patents and the knowledge regarding the filling of patent application. Patent is much more valuable for a researcher and it is a wellestablished fact, but Indian researchers seem to not value it much at present. Japanese articles and research papers are often accompanied with a prefiled patent application.

Although publication has certain advantages, but the patent can be more useful as Patent = good publication + IP. Patent gives an authority to sell the product whereas paper gives an idea of the work to others to do further research. A good patented product can be commercialized and gives value over and above a paper. Research paper is a discussion over your work done. However, patent is the first step towards commercialized production of work. Patent, therefore, has more worth than Publication.

The content of this article is intended to provide a general guide to the subject matter. Specialist advice should be sought about your specific circumstances.

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How to patent a research paper in India?

Before understanding how to patent a research paper, we first need to understand whether a research paper can be patented.

Can you patent a research paper?

The legal treatment on patenting a published vs an unpublished research work is different from each other.

This can be understood by 2 scenarios in order to patent a research paper:

Scenario 1: Unpublished research paper or research work

If your research paper is not yet published, find out if it has patentable content . If it does not have patentable content, you can proceed with publishing it right away without worrying about patenting it. However, if it does have patentable content, you should file a provisional patent application before publishing your research paper. The provisional patent application should be filed before the research is published because that gives you a priority date before it goes in public domain. This also means your legal right on your invention is established that prevents others from exploiting your invention.

After filing the provisional patent application, you can publish the research paper and pursue a non-provisional patent application in the succeeding 1 year. An important caveat here is that your legal right stays maintained only if you file a non-provisional patent application after the provisional patent application. If you do not pursue the non-provisional patent application, the provisional patent application gets abandoned and your right is lost.

Alternately, you can directly file a non-provisional application but it takes more time and effort compared to a provisional patent application. The succeeding 1 year that patent law allows after filing the provisional patent application, really helps inventors gather more details and funds to pursue the non-provisional patent application.

Scenario 2: Published research paper

If the research paper is already published, it can be a potential prior art for your patent application covering the same subject matter. In the patenting world, prior art is any document that covers the features of your invention and thus, prevents the invention from being new or non-obvious. This means that if your research paper was published before you applied for a patent for the same subject matter, it prevents your subject matter (in the patent) from being novel because it becomes the prior art (being in public domain) for your patent application.

To avoid the above situation, you should file a provisional patent application before you publish the research paper or even disclose it to any one else. Once you have filed the provisional patent application, it establishes a priority date for your invention even before your invention goes into public domain. You can now feel free to publish the research paper or disclose your subject matter as long as it is the same subject matter you filed the provisional patent application on. In other words, this means that if any one alleges that it’s their content and if your priority date is earlier than theirs, your priority date proves your precedence.

What to do if you have already disclosed your research or published your research paper?

If you have already disclosed your research work to someone with whom you have a non-disclosure agreement (NDA), they are legally bound not to publish/disclose that content, depending on the terms of the NDA. However, there may be a risk that the recipient of that information may intentionally or unintentionally violate the terms of the NDA, eventually causing your content to leak in to the public domain. The thumb rule to follow here is that you should immediately file a provisional patent application to establish the earliest priority date.

There are very specific (read rare) scenarios, where the Indian Patent Act allows a grace period of 1 year up to which you are allowed to file a patent application after external disclosure. For instance, there is a provision in section 31(d) of the Indian Patent Act that indicates that if you (being the true and first inventor) read the description of your invention before a learned society or the description is published with your consent in the transactions of such a society , you are allowed to file a patent application within 1 year of this disclosure. In this scenario, this external disclosure will not be considered as prior art.

However, the terms ‘transactions’ and ‘learned society’ have not been defined by either the Patent Act or Courts in India yet. A noteworthy point here is that this provision specifically mentions that the disclosure should be in the transactions of the learned society , which can be interpreted as proceedings of that learned society. Therefore, publications in forums and/or on websites (society) may not necessarily include transactions of the society because such publications are accessible by general public and may not necessarily be for the proceedings of such forums. This makes the scope of this section extremely narrow and it may not prove to be your ultimate saviour in scenario 2 unless your external disclosure strictly satisfies the criteria in section 31(d).

Consequently, if you have already published your idea such that it is accessible to general public, it becomes a prior art and prevents you from patenting the same subject matter. Therefore, the only way to apply for a patent is to make additional non-obvious improvements to the idea by adding unique features and then, applying for a patent application.

To digest the above information, here’s a quick visual you can use if you think your research work has patentable content:

Hope the above article was helpful in relating the research paper to the patenting process. Do comment below if you have any queries or thoughts!

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FTC Announces Rule Banning Noncompetes

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Today, the Federal Trade Commission issued a final rule to promote competition by banning noncompetes nationwide, protecting the fundamental freedom of workers to change jobs, increasing innovation, and fostering new business formation.

“Noncompete clauses keep wages low, suppress new ideas, and rob the American economy of dynamism, including from the more than 8,500 new startups that would be created a year once noncompetes are banned,” said FTC Chair Lina M. Khan. “The FTC’s final rule to ban noncompetes will ensure Americans have the freedom to pursue a new job, start a new business, or bring a new idea to market.”

The FTC estimates that the final rule banning noncompetes will lead to new business formation growing by 2.7% per year, resulting in more than 8,500 additional new businesses created each year. The final rule is expected to result in higher earnings for workers, with estimated earnings increasing for the average worker by an additional $524 per year, and it is expected to lower health care costs by up to $194 billion over the next decade. In addition, the final rule is expected to help drive innovation, leading to an estimated average increase of 17,000 to 29,000 more patents each year for the next 10 years under the final rule.

Noncompetes are a widespread and often exploitative practice imposing contractual conditions that prevent workers from taking a new job or starting a new business. Noncompetes often force workers to either stay in a job they want to leave or bear other significant harms and costs, such as being forced to switch to a lower-paying field, being forced to relocate, being forced to leave the workforce altogether, or being forced to defend against expensive litigation. An estimated 30 million workers—nearly one in five Americans—are subject to a noncompete.

Under the FTC’s new rule, existing noncompetes for the vast majority of workers will no longer be enforceable after the rule’s effective date. Existing noncompetes for senior executives - who represent less than 0.75% of workers - can remain in force under the FTC’s final rule, but employers are banned from entering into or attempting to enforce any new noncompetes, even if they involve senior executives. Employers will be required to provide notice to workers other than senior executives who are bound by an existing noncompete that they will not be enforcing any noncompetes against them.

In January 2023, the FTC issued a  proposed rule which was subject to a 90-day public comment period. The FTC received more than 26,000 comments on the proposed rule, with over 25,000 comments in support of the FTC’s proposed ban on noncompetes. The comments informed the FTC’s final rulemaking process, with the FTC carefully reviewing each comment and making changes to the proposed rule in response to the public’s feedback.

In the final rule, the Commission has determined that it is an unfair method of competition, and therefore a violation of Section 5 of the FTC Act, for employers to enter into noncompetes with workers and to enforce certain noncompetes.

The Commission found that noncompetes tend to negatively affect competitive conditions in labor markets by inhibiting efficient matching between workers and employers. The Commission also found that noncompetes tend to negatively affect competitive conditions in product and service markets, inhibiting new business formation and innovation. There is also evidence that noncompetes lead to increased market concentration and higher prices for consumers.

Alternatives to Noncompetes

The Commission found that employers have several alternatives to noncompetes that still enable firms to protect their investments without having to enforce a noncompete.

Trade secret laws and non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) both provide employers with well-established means to protect proprietary and other sensitive information. Researchers estimate that over 95% of workers with a noncompete already have an NDA.

The Commission also finds that instead of using noncompetes to lock in workers, employers that wish to retain employees can compete on the merits for the worker’s labor services by improving wages and working conditions.

Changes from the NPRM

Under the final rule, existing noncompetes for senior executives can remain in force. Employers, however, are prohibited from entering into or enforcing new noncompetes with senior executives. The final rule defines senior executives as workers earning more than $151,164 annually and who are in policy-making positions.

Additionally, the Commission has eliminated a provision in the proposed rule that would have required employers to legally modify existing noncompetes by formally rescinding them. That change will help to streamline compliance.

Instead, under the final rule, employers will simply have to provide notice to workers bound to an existing noncompete that the noncompete agreement will not be enforced against them in the future. To aid employers’ compliance with this requirement, the Commission has included model language in the final rule that employers can use to communicate to workers. 

The Commission vote to approve the issuance of the final rule was 3-2 with Commissioners Melissa Holyoak and Andrew N. Ferguson voting no. Commissioners Rebecca Kelly Slaughter , Alvaro Bedoya , Melissa Holyoak and Andrew N. Ferguson each issued separate statements. Chair Lina M. Khan will issue a separate statement.

The final rule will become effective 120 days after publication in the Federal Register.

Once the rule is effective, market participants can report information about a suspected violation of the rule to the Bureau of Competition by emailing  [email protected] . 

The Federal Trade Commission develops policy initiatives on issues that affect competition, consumers, and the U.S. economy. The FTC will never demand money, make threats, tell you to transfer money, or promise you a prize. Follow the  FTC on social media , read  consumer alerts  and the  business blog , and  sign up to get the latest FTC news and alerts .

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