Public Disclosures
Types of Disclosures
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How is a public disclosure defined?
A public disclosure is any disclosure that is:
- Patented
- Published in a printed publication
- In public use
- On sale
- Otherwise available to the public prior to the filing date of a patent application
If a public disclosure of an invention is made prior to filing a patent application claiming that invention, patent rights may be lost.
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What are some examples of public disclosures?
- A printed abstract or paper (online or hard copy) or preprint server
- A poster presented at a conference meeting
- A talk given at a conference meeting
- Master’s theses and Ph.D. dissertations
- Thesis defenses open to the public
- Department-level and campus-level seminars if open to the public
- A public disclosure made by an inventor more than one year before the inventor’s patent application filing date
- A sale or an offer to sell research materials or prototypes of an invention
- Study details associated with clinical trials posted on https://clinicaltrials.gov/
- Funded federal agency grant proposals
Note that funded federal agency grant proposals are public disclosures because they can be obtained under the Freedom of Information Act. Steps can be taken, however, to maintain certain information as confidential where necessary. For example, the first page of the proposal should be marked “Confidential Information – Pages __ to __ of this proposal contain potentially patentable information.” Each of these pages should also be marked “CONFIDENTIAL.”
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What are some examples of nonpublic disclosures?
- A disclosure made under a confidentiality agreement
- Lab meetings attended by only university employees and students
- Department or faculty meetings attended by only university employees and students
- Papers submitted for publication prior to acceptance and publication
- An unfunded federal agency grant application
- A high-level disclosure that does not provide enough details for another person skilled in the art to make or use the invention
- A disclosure of the invention by the inventor less than one year before the inventor files a patent application (U.S. only)
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Would uploading information into an AI chatbot be a public disclosure?
[This guidance was written on Feb. 25, 2025. Because of the fast-advancing nature of generative AI technology and its use, future updates to this guidance may be published as needed.]
OTD advises strong caution regarding submitting detailed descriptions of new inventions and other unpublished, confidential information into publicly accessible web-based AI chatbots. While there is no definitive word yet on this matter, it is possible that, depending on circumstances, doing so may be considered a public disclosure. The free tier of OpenAI's ChatGPT that is accessed via https://chatgpt.com/ is a popular, and thus illustrative, example. Under its terms of use (https://openai.com/policies/terms-of-use/), OpenAI is not obligated to keep confidential any of the user-uploaded material. Furthermore, OpenAI is free to use any such material "to provide, maintain, develop, and improve" its services, including further training of future iterations of its AI models. Other freely accessible, web-based AI chatbots similar to ChatGPT (e.g., Claude, DeepSeek, Grok, etc.) likely have similar terms of use. Also, because ChatGPT and other similar AI chatbots can accept and process very large text inputs (currently 8,000 tokens on the free tier of ChatGPT, roughly equivalent to 5,000~6,000 words), it is very easy to submit a detailed and complete (and thus enabling) description of an invention into it. For general guidance from UTSW Information Resources on AI data security and privacy, please see https://www.utsouthwestern.net/intranet/administration/information-resources/ai/
Patent Rights When Disclosing
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Does a public disclosure always lead to loss of patent rights?
Not all public disclosures lead to the loss of patent rights. Public disclosures that do not provide a detailed or “enabling” description of the invention, such that a person of ordinary skill in the art could make and use the invention, will not result in the loss of patent rights.
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Is there a grace period for public disclosures in the United States?
In the United States, an inventor’s public disclosure of their own invention less than one year prior to the filing date of their patent application is not considered prior art. In most foreign countries, there is no inventor grace period, and any public disclosure made prior to filing a patent application will prevent patenting of the invention. Therefore, it is always best to file a patent application before any public disclosure.