Copyright: A legal protection for original works of authorship, including literary, dramatic, musical, architectural, cartographic, choreographic, pantomimic, pictorial, graphic, sculptural, and audiovisual creations. Definition from Copyright Office, https://www.copyright.gov/help/faq/definitions.html; accessed March 2023.

Design patent: A grant of a property right to an inventor to protect the visual ornamental characteristics of an article of manufacture.

Economic sectors: Economic activity is organized in national economic accounts into four sectors: business, government, nonprofits serving households, and households. This organization has also been recommended for innovation statistics (OECD/Eurostat 2018). In the statistical data in this report, public universities and private nonprofit universities are shown together as academic institutions. The term individuals refers to the household economic sector.

European Union (EU-27): The EU comprises 27 member nations: Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czechia, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, and Sweden. As of 2020, the United Kingdom is not a member of the EU.

Innovation: A new or improved product or process (or combination thereof) that differs significantly from the unit’s previous products or processes and that has been made available to potential users (product) or brought into use by the unit (process). The unit is a generic term to describe the actor responsible for innovations. It refers to any institutional unit in any sector, including households and their individual members, according to the Oslo Manual 2018 (OECD/Eurostat 2018).

Intellectual property: Creations of the mind including inventions, literary and artistic works, and symbols, names, images, and designs used in commerce. Industrial intellectual property includes patents, utility models, trademarks, and industrial designs. Intellectual property covered by copyright includes literary, artistic, and musical works. Available at https://www.wipo.int/about-ip/en/; accessed March 2023.

International patents: These are original patents that have been issued by any international jurisdiction, adjusted to count only the first issuance of a series or family of related patents. The unit of measurement is a patent family that shares a single original invention in common. All subsequent patents in a family refer to the first patent filed, or priority patent, and the indicator provides an unduplicated count of original or priority patents in any individual jurisdiction.

Invention: Any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof (USPTO 2020).

Knowledge transfer: The process by which technology or knowledge developed in one place or for one purpose is applied and used in another place for the same or a different purpose. This transfer can occur freely or through exchange and be deliberate or unintentional. Technology transfer represents a specific case of knowledge transfer that involves the transfer of knowledge embedded in technology.

Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD): An international organization of 34 countries headquartered in Paris, France. The member countries are Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Chile, Czechia, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, Mexico, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, Slovenia, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Among its many activities, OECD compiles social, economic, and science and technology statistics for all member and selected nonmember countries.

Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) patent: As defined by USPTO, a property right granted by the U.S. government to an inventor “to exclude others from making, using, offering for sale, or selling the invention throughout the United States or importing the invention into the United States” for a limited time in exchange for public disclosure of the invention when the patent is granted. Available at https://www.uspto.gov/learning-and-resources/glossary; accessed December 2023.

Patent family: See international patents.

Patenting intensity: Number of patents per population in a geographic location.

Priority patent: The first patent filed in a family of subsequent patents that refers to the original patent. The original filing may be domestic or from another jurisdiction.

Technical field in patents: Chemistry: Biotechnology, pharmaceuticals, organic fine chemistry, microstructural and nanotechnology, chemical engineering, macromolecular chemistry and polymers, basic materials chemistry, materials, metallurgy, surface technology, coating, environmental technology, food chemistry. Electrical engineering: Computer technology, electrical machinery, apparatus and energy, semiconductors, digital communication, telecommunications, audio-visual technology, basic communication processes, information technology methods for management. Mechanical engineering: Other special machines, engines, pumps, and turbines; transport; mechanical elements; machine tools; textile and paper machines; thermal processes and apparatus; handling. Instruments: Medical technology, measurement, analysis of biological materials, optics, control. Other categories: Civil engineering, other consumer goods, furniture, games.

Technology transfer: The process by which technology or knowledge developed in one place or for one purpose is applied and exploited in another place or for another purpose. In the federal setting, technology transfer is the process by which existing knowledge, facilities, or capabilities developed under federal research and development funding are used to fulfill public and private needs.

Trade secret: Information that fulfills all the following requirements, as defined by the Patent and Trademark Office: “Either actual or potential independent economic value by virtue of not being generally known, has value to others who cannot legitimately obtain the information, and is subject to reasonable efforts to maintain its secrecy.” Available at https://www.uspto.gov/ip-policy/trade-secret-policy; accessed December 2023.

Trademark: A word, phrase, symbol, design, or a combination thereof, that identifies and distinguishes the source of the goods of one party from those of others. In this report, trademark refers to both goods and services.

Utility patent: Intellectual property protection for a potentially useful, previously unknown, and nonobvious invention.

ABS: Annual Business Survey

AI: artificial intelligence

CCAT: climate change adaptation technologies

CCMT: climate change mitigation technologies

COVID-19: Coronavirus Disease 2019

CRADA: cooperative research and development agreement

DOC: Department of Commerce

DOD: Department of Defense

DOE: Department of Energy

EPO: European Patent Office

EU-27: European Union

HHS: Department of Health and Human Services

KTI: knowledge and technology intensive

NASA: National Aeronautics and Space Administration

NCSES: National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics

NIST: National Institute of Standards and Technology

OECD: Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development

PCT: Patent Cooperation Treaty

R&D: research and development

S&E: science and engineering

SBIR: Small Business Innovation Research

STTR: Small Business Technology Transfer

USDA: Department of Agriculture

USPTO: Patent and Trademark Office

WIPO: World Intellectual Property Organization