Innovation and Rights - Developing Biomedical Devices: Design, Innovation and Protection - page 40

3. Additionally, the content of European patent applications as filed, the dates of
filing of which are prior to the date referred to in paragraph 2 and which were
published on or after that date, shall be considered as comprised in the state of
the art.
4. Paragraphs 2 and 3 shall not exclude the patentability of any substance or com-
position, comprised in the state of the art, for use in a method referred to in
Article 53 (c), provided that its use for any such method is not comprised in the
state of the art.
5. Paragraphs 2 and 3 also shall not exclude the patentability of any substance or
composition referred to in Paragraph 4 for any specific use in a method referred
to in Article 53 (c), provided that such use is not comprised in the state of the art.
Art. 46 (Legislative Decree No. 30 of 10 February 2005)
1. An invention shall be considered to be new if it does not form part of the state
of the art.
2. The state of the art consists of everything made available to the public, in the
territory of the State or abroad, before the patent filing date, by means of a writ-
ten or oral description, by use or in any other way.
3. Additionally, the content of national patent applications or of European or
international patent applications designating Italy and being effective therein,
as they were filed, the dates of filing of which are prior to the date referred to
in paragraph 2 and which were published or made available to the public on or
after that date, shall be considered as comprised in the state of the art.
4. The provisions of paragraphs 1, 2 and 3 shall not exclude the patentability of
any substance or substance composition already comprised in the state of the
art, provided that it is aimed at a new use.
3.3.1.1 Comments
The novelty requirement aims at not allowing for the patenting of what is already
known.
The basic concepts are the notion of absolute novelty (the state of the art com-
prises all the knowledge, wherever it has been made accessible to the public, by
any means) and not accessible to the public .
The state of the art consists of four categories of concepts [ 13 ]:
• the common general knowledge (contained in textbooks and in the main techni-
cal papers);
• enhanced knowledge (all patents published by the USPTO, the EPO and the
JPO, the patent literature of the most industrialized and of non-industrialized
countries specialized in technology);
• the hidden knowledge (graduation thesis, conferences, publications iled in
libraries, etc…);
• patent applications iled before but not yet published.