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Question:
List at least 3 special cases (those which are advanced out of turn for examination).
Answer:
The following is a list of special cases (those which are advanced out of turn for examination):
- (A) Applications on inventions that are deemed of peculiar importance to some branch of the public service and when for that reason the head of some department of the Government requests immediate action and the Director of the USPTO so orders.
- (B) Applications made special as a result of a petition to make special, a request for prioritized examination, or a request for participation in a PPH program.
- (C) Applications for reissues, particularly those involved in stayed litigation.
- (D) Applications remanded by an appellate tribunal for further action.
- (E) Applications, once taken up for action by an examiner according to their effective filing date, should be treated as special by an examiner, art unitor Technology Center to which they may subsequently be transferred; exemplary situations include new cases transferred as the result of a telephone election and cases transferred as the result of a timely reply to any official action.
- (F) Applications which appear to interfere with other applications previously considered and found to be allowable, or which will be placed in interference with an unexpired patent or patents.
- (G) Applications ready for allowance, or ready for allowance except as to formal matters.
- (H) Applications which are in condition for final rejection.
- (I) Applications pending more than 5 years, including those which, by relation to a prior United States application, have an effective pendency of more than 5 years.
- (J) Reexamination proceedings.
Chapter Details:
The answer to this question can be found in chapter 700 of the MPEP. This chapter covers Examination of Applications.
The answer is from the 9th Edition, Revision 10.2019. Depending on future changes to the MPEP, the question and answer may or may not be applicable in later Editions or revisions.
Section Summary:
This question and answer comes from section 708.01 of the MPEP. The following is a brief summary of section 708.01.
708.01 List of Special Cases
This section references 37 C.F.R. 1.102 which discusses the advancement of examination. It includes a list of special cases which are advanced out of turn for examination.