Title:

Searching Libraries and Searching Patents 

Author:

John Barnard
Barnard Chemical Information Ltd

Abstract:

Search systems for the Markush structures found in chemical patents have
been available through online services with proprietary databases for a
couple of decades now, but there are no commercially-available in-house
systems. Simpler forms of Markush structure are also used to represent
combinatorial libraries, where Markush structure-handling techniques can
be used to achieve order-of-magnitude speedups (compared to
enumeration-based approaches) in structure searching and property
calculation for large virtual libraries. This poster discusses the
enhancements needed to library-handling software to permit the integration
of in-house patent databases. These include the need for text analysis and
name translation in patent claims, and the handling of generic expressions
such as "alkyl" and "heterocycle".