Citation Table
Return to Patent.
Table Structure
Table "public.citation" Column | Type | Modifiers --------+--------+----------- patent | bigint | cited | bigint |
Example of table entries:
patent | cited --------+--------- 9226898 | 4935450 9226898 | 5069936 9226898 | 6262019 9226898 | 6264988 9226898 | 6916795 9226898 | 9226898 | 9226898 | 9226898 | 9226898 | 9226898 | 9226899 | 7858080 9226899 | 9226899 | 9226899 |
Table Variables
Patent refers to a patent number. Cited refers to a patent number cited by the patent in question. When a patent is issued, the patent can include citations or references to patents in a related field or that may be considered prior art. The table has a composite key that consists of a unique combination of patent number and cited patent number.
Table Purpose
The US patent system allows for inventors, patent attorneys, and USPTO patent examiners to reference other patents that are considered prior art or related inventions. These references are theoretically in place to limit or help define the scope of a patent's claims. Often times, the patent improves upon these referenced patents or may be a new application of previously patented subject matter. Citations may also be unrelated to the patent's subject matter, and therefore, cannot be fully relied upon in studies of innovation and transfer of ideas between inventors. [1] For the Little Guy Academic Paper the citation data may be used as a measure of litigation risk for a patent, as suggested previously by a paper by Lanjouw Schankerman studying patent litigation of small firms. A patent may be more likely to be litigated if it cites many patents or a patent may be at higher risk if it does not cite related subject matter as other inventors may consider this infringement. Our hope is to further investigate the importance and effects of patent citations and define their role in patent litigation and dissemination of knowledge between inventors and IP centered firms. Additionally, the McNair center plans on defining whether or not citations characterize patent quality, whether a patent is useful and novel.
Current Problems
The table has two columns, 'citingpatentnumber' and 'citedpatentnumber'. There are rows with 'citedpatentnumber' greater than 10000000. For instance:
citingpatentnumber | citedpatentnumber
--------------------+-------------------
9226901 | 102005013726
9226905 | 101332187
9226905 | 2006528175
9226905 | 2011513304
9226905 | 1020090061010
9226905 | 1020110049808
9226905 | 2010126349
9226909 | 101340916
9226909 | 10128910
9226914 | 102318827
9226914 | 2014109862
9226915 | 10111049
9226918 | 2008005345
9226918 | 2008005345
9226918 | 2008077092
9226918 | 2008077092
9226918 | 2008070268
9226918 | 2008128126
9226921 | 2008129994
9226922 | 2012000595
9226922 | 2012058127
9226923 | 2010135524
9226930 | 102002040
9226930 | 19507522
9226930 | 50106981
9226930 | 53082783
9226930 | 57052334
9226930 | 10029979
9226930 | 10045750
9226931 | 2008203212
9226931 | 2010227111
9226931 | 2012068515
9226931 | 2013106565
9226932 | 103458880
9226933 | 2006257751
9226933 | 101366734
9226933 | 101396048
9226933 | 101926831
9226933 | 20202562
9226933 | 202005009120
9226933 | 61063618
9226937 | 11510473
9226937 | 2001506579
9226937 | 2001519791
9226937 | 2003119127
9226937 | 2003517831
9226937 | 2005099761
9226937 | 2006076681
9226937 | 2006078941
9226937 | 2006079021
9226937 | 2006094209
9226937 | 2006094210
9226937 | 2006094233
9226937 | 2006094235
allpatent_clone=# SELECT COUNT(*) FROM citations WHERE citedpatentnumber>10000000; count --------- 1411140 (1 row)
allpatent_clone=# SELECT COUNT(*) FROM citations WHERE citedpatentnumber IS NULL; count ---------- 23516667 (1 row)
allpatent_clone=# SELECT COUNT(*) FROM citations; count ---------- 97680838 (1 row)
Possible Solution
Jul 8, 2016: The blank citedpatentnumbers were created due to inconsistency between the original type and the type in the citation table (string to integer). The blank entries mostly correspond to publication number, non-U.S. patent number, and non-standardized patent number. The next step would be to recreate the table accounting for these issues. The U.S. publication number could be matched to the publications numbers in the histpatent table and be replaced by the corresponding patent numbers.
The foreign cited patents will be moved to a separate table.
