Librarian
Renee Romero
Contact:
Science and Engineering Library (SEL)
Subjects: Biology & Life Sciences, Psychology
About Patents
Patents are a rich source of technical information that may not be available elsewhere. Patent documents contain detailed descriptions of the invention, sometimes with supporting drawings. The US Patent and Trademark Office website and Google Patents (both linked to the right) are both great places to start your search.
To learn more about patent searches, take a look at the University of Texas at Austin's Guide to Patent Searching or UCLA's guide on Patents and Patent Searching.
Patent Databases
- US Patent and Trademark OfficeGood site to search for most recent US patents. Searches front page information in US patent starting from 1790. Searches full-text information in US patents issued starting 1976 to the Tuesday prior to today's date (US patents are issued every Tuesday). You can download the full text images as TIFF files - page by page only - but they are free.
- USPTO CPC SchemeAllows you to browse by classification (a code number assigned to broad categories of invention)
- Google PatentsEasily access full pdfs of patents. Can search by keyword or classification code. To search by CPC code use this syntax "cpc:B01B 1/02" where B01B 1/02 is the CPC code.
- European Patent OfficeSimple searches on bibliographic data in patent documents. You can download full text images as PDF files - page by page only - but they are free.
- About Google Patent Search (U.S. Patents)Provides simple and advanced searches of U.S. Patents; PDF files.
- The LensThe Lens serves global patent and scholarly knowledge as a public resource to make science- and technology-enabled problem solving more effective, efficient and inclusive.
- Freepatents OnlineMillions of US patents searchable. One PDF per patent Future plans to add US applications.
- DEPATISnet informationDatabase contains US (1790+), EP(1978+) and WO (1978+). Database also contains the following country patents: DE-1877+, DD-1946+, AT-1920+, CH-1888+, FR-1920+, GB-1920+, JP-1976+ Patents and Applications are in one site. Link to full text of patent. Website is available in English and German You can download the full text images as PDF files - page by page - but they are free
- SurfIPUS-1790+, WO-97+, EP-97+, CH, CA, Taiwan and Singapore Patents and JP patent abstracts. Registration is required You may also combine the search with Internet Search Engines such as Google or Northern Light and Business Databases like Hoovers. You can download full text images as PDF files - page by page only - but they are free.