patent-search - Claude MCP Skill

# Patent Search Skill

This skill points Claude at the BigQuery patent-search tools registered by the patent-creator MCP server. Call the tools directly; do not shell out to Python.

## When to use

- Find prior art by keyword, classification, or family.
- Pull full patent records (title, abstract, claims, description) for US patents.
- Cross-reference an EP/WO patent into its US family member to get full text.

## Available MCP tools

| Tool | What it does |
|------|--------------|
| `search_patents_bigquery` | Keyword search across abstract / title / claims (US only for claims). |
| `get_patent_bigquery` | Full patent details by publication number. |
| `search_patents_by_cpc_bigquery` | Search by CPC classification prefix. |
| `search_patents_by_ipc_bigquery` | Search by IPC classification prefix (good for older or non-US patents). |
| `search_patent_family_bigquery` | All publications sharing a family ID across jurisdictions. |
| `check_bigquery_status` | Verify auth and quota project before a long workflow. |

## Cost notes

BigQuery on-demand pricing is $6.25 / TiB (1 TiB free per month). The MCP server enforces a per-query bytes-billed ceiling, defaulting to 350 GiB. Override via `PATENT_BIGQUERY_MAX_BYTES_BILLED` if you need a larger scan window.

## Choosing keywords

- 2-3 keywords work better than long phrases (BigQuery `LIKE` matching is literal).
- For non-US patents, `claims` is empty in the dataset; the MCP keyword tool already searches title/abstract for those jurisdictions. For full text on EP/WO, use the EPO OPS tools instead.
- Use `search_patent_family_bigquery` to bridge from an EP/WO hit to its US family member when you need claims.

## Common workflows

**Prior art sweep:**
1. `search_patents_bigquery(query=…, country="US")` — broad scan.
2. Pick the top hits' CPC codes from `get_patent_bigquery`.
3. `search_patents_by_cpc_bigquery(cpc_code=…)` — pull adjacent technology.

**Cross-jurisdiction lookup:**
1. `search_patents_bigquery(query=…, country="EP")`.
2. For any EP hit, `get_patent_bigquery` to get its `family_id`.
3. `search_patent_family_bigquery(family_id=…)` to find the US member with full claims.