Eighteen-Month Publication
USPTO must require that each utility and plant application be in condition for publication when released to TC for examination
- contains the filing fee and an executed oath/declaration
- specification of sufficient quality for optical character recognition (OCR) conversion of image to text
- title and abstract in compliance with 37 CFR 1.72
- drawings acceptable for use in the patent application publication as a prior art document
- drawings may be “acceptable” even if designated as “informal” by the applicant
- sequence listing CRF in compliance with 37 CFR 1.821 et seq.