I had to look it up
Composition of matter patent
View attachment 3589787
Fyi
In
United States patent law, a
composition of matter is one of the four principal categories of things that may be patented. The other three are a process (also termed a
method), a
machine, and an
article of manufacture. In United States patent law, that same terminology has been in use since the first patent act in 1790 (with the exception that processes were formerly termed "arts").
[1]
The
United States Supreme Court has defined "composition of matter" to mean "all compositions of two or more substances and all composite articles, whether they be the results of chemical union, or of mechanical mixture, or whether they be gases, fluids, powders or solids."
[2]
Robinson on Patents has defined "composition of matter" in these terms:
A composition of matter is an instrument formed by the intermixture of two or more ingredients, and possessing properties which belong to none of these ingredients in their separate state. ...The intermixture of ingredients in a composition of matter may be produced by mechanical or chemical operations, and its result may be a compound substance resolvable into its constituent elements by mechanical processes, or a new substance which can be destroyed only by chemical analysis.
[4]
Thoughts of why this term composition of matter wording was included in announcement
