The characteristics of patent literature：
 

(1)   The patent literature is large in number and wide in content
Presently, about ninety countries, regions or international patent organizations publish patent literatures in about 30 official languages. The number of the patent literatures is so large that it accounts for one fourth of the four million scientific publications published every year in the world. Besides, the number is ever increasing at a rate of one million each year. The patent literature almost covers all the technical fiThe patent literature is large eld of the production activities of human.

(2)   Patent literature is an integration of language, technology and law
Patent literature contains such legal information as technical solution, defining the range of the protection of the patent right, disclosing the patentee, change in the right of the owner of registered certificate, etc. Meanwhile, the sales volume, the potential market, the economic benefit and the international competitive scope of the patent literature can be analyzed according to the areal distribution of the application and approval of the patent. And therefore, the patent literature is a unique comprehensive source of technological information.

(3)   A reflection of new technological information
Firstly, the patent office in most countries will apply in advance so as to ensure that the inventor submits the application as early as possible after finishing the invention in case that other people may apply first. Secondly, since novelty is the prerequisite of a patent, inventions will be published in the form of patent literature other than other scientific and technical forms. Thirdly, the implementation of disclosure system of patent application in the early 1970s accelerates the spread of scientific and technical information in the society.

(4)   Unified format, normal form
The patent specifications published by all the countries share the same structure, including the title page, the claim, the specification, the drawing, etc. the title page adopts the INID code used internationally to mark the items of description, thereby leading the reader to get to know and search for the inventor, the applicant, the country applying for protection, the grant of patent right, the abstract of the patent and other relevant information. The claim depicts the technical characteristics and the protection range applied for. The specification describes the content of the invention clearly and completely. The drawing is a supplementary to the written specification. What’s more, each patent literature adopts or marks the international patent classification which classifies the technical field to which the invention belongs, thus the inventions of all the countries are integrated to be a scientific and technical information source which is systematic and easy to retrieve.