Claims
The scope of protection of a patent is defined by the claims. As mentioned above the claims contained in a patent application are often amended before the patent is issued resulting in a more narrow scope of protection. A number of different categories of claims exist: apparatus claims describe physical components constituting an apparatus or a machine. Method claims describe the various steps of operating a machine or manufacturing a product. Use claims describe different applications of an apparatus or a method or the purpose thereof. Furthermore, the claims are divided into ”independent claims” not referring to other claims and ”dependent claims” (also referred to as subsidiary claims) referring to other claims. Consequently, the scope of protection of dependent claims is defined by all mentioned claims collectively.
A patent/patent application often contains one or more independent apparatus and method claims. As independent claims contain the broadest definitions of the scope of protection of a patent, it is often not relevant to go through all dependent claims. However, this is not the case with patent applications as independent claims have not yet been subject to final approval and will often be narrowed by insertion of dependent claims.
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