skip to main content
U.S. Flag

An official website of the United States government

Icon depicting a Classical-style government building

Official websites use .gov
A .gov website belongs to an official government organization in the United States.

Padlock Icon signifying a secure connection

Secure .gov websites use HTTPS
A lock ( ) or https:// means you've safely connected to the .gov website. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites.

Factsheet for DOE Lab Researchers: Patents - PDF

Patents - Labs - June 2021 (143.82 KB)

Figure 277578: Factsheet for DOE Lab Researchers: Patents - Page 1

STIP Product Type Fact Sheet for DOE Laboratory Researchers

Patents

ABOUT STI

In the course of performing research and development (R&D) and other scientific and technological work, researchers funded by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) produce scientific and technical information (STI) to document and disseminate their findings.

STI includes products such as journal articles, technical reports, conference presentations, books, and more. Through the Scientific and Technical Information Program (STIP), the DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI) collaborates with people across the DOE complex, including Headquarters programs, field offices, national laboratories, and other facilities. The STIP partnership ensures that the results of DOE- funded work are identified, disseminated, and preserved. Thus, OSTI collects STI produced across the DOE laboratory and facility complex as well as from financial assistance recipients.

DEFINITION

A patent for an invention is the grant of a property right to the inventor, which in the United States is issued by the U. S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). The patent gives the holder exclusive rights to a process, design or new invention for a designated period of time. The assignee could be a government agency or a company that is a contractor or grant recipient. After a patent is issued, the USPTO includes the patent in its database, making the patent application, full text, and other descriptive information accessible to the public. If DOE-funded research led to the patent, then this research result is of interest to DOE as a form of STI. The DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI) obtains patent records of interest to DOE directly from USPTO; however, to ensure comprehensiveness, broad dissemination, and archival preservation, inventors funded by DOE may find it useful to submit information to OSTI through their particular STI submission channels.

SUBMISSIONS

Each DOE laboratory has a site program to manage scientific and technical information produced under the contract and to make it available to DOEs Office of Scientific and Technical Information. Each sites STI Manager is involved in the process; for more information, see the listing of STI Managers at https://www.osti.gov/stip/about/stip-community#STIManagers.

For patents, the researcher has the option to (1) use the Labs processes for STI submission, providing metadata for a patent as well as a full-text document in searchable PDF format or (2) rely on the OSTI-USPTO process for ensuring access via a link to the document hosted by USPTO. If the latter is the Labs preference, periodic review of the Labs patents in the OSTI collection is desirable to ensure that all patents from the Lab are being included.

Patents - Lab Researchers - Page 1

Figure 277579: Factsheet for DOE Lab Researchers: Patents - Page 2

STI AVAILABILITY

OSTI.GOV is the primary search tool for DOE science, technology, and engineering research and development results and the organizational hub for information about the DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information. Launched in 2018, it consolidates OSTIs home page and the previous search tool SciTech Connect. OSTI.GOV makes discoverable over 70 years of research results from DOE and its predecessor agencies. Research results include journal articles/accepted manuscripts and related metadata; technical reports; scientific research datasets and collections; scientific software; patents; conference and workshop papers; books and theses; and multimedia. OSTI.GOV contains over 3 million records, including citations to 1.5 million journal articles, 1 million of which have digital object identifiers (DOIs) linking to full-text articles on publishers' websites. OSTI.GOV provides access to this DOE STI by offering numerous easy-to-use search capabilities and customization options; and for the DOE community, additional citation information is available to help researchers evaluate article impact and find related research.

DOE Patents (http://www.osti.gov/doepatents/) is a search tool for discovering patent information resulting from DOE-funded research and development (R&D), consisting of bibliographic records with full text where available, either via a PDF document or a link to the record at the USPTO (http://www.uspto.gov). DOE Patents provides comprehensive coverage of patents resulting from DOE funding.

OSTI.GOV and DOE Patents are included in the Federal science portal Science.gov and the international science portal WorldWideScience.org. Science.gov, hosted by OSTI, offers free access to research and development (R&D) results and scientific and technical information from more than 60 databases from scientific organizations across 13 federal agencies. WorldWideScience.org searches over 100 STI resources including national libraries and information centers from more than 70 countries.

OSTI also works in close collaboration with Google and others, using Sitemap Protocols and other information industry standards to facilitate the discovery of DOE STI through widely used search engines.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION/CONTACTS
The STIP website at https://www.osti.gov/stip/
OSTI staff will respond to questions/suggestions sent to stip@osti.gov
Questions related to E-Link may also be sent to elink_Helpdesk@osti.gov

Patents - Lab Researchers - Page 2