Plans and Proposals

I have very recently come to the conclusion that I might want to look into the patenting process and procedures regarding the two inventions I mentioned in my last post. It would be in my best interest to patent them both as soon as possible, so as to have the concepts locked in as mine (and my partner's) - I have decided to continue with his help on the remote sensing program. The volcanology related invention is mine alone, however. I am not entirely sure how else to proceed on these inventions. If we need a prototype prior to patenting - then we got some problems since both ideas are still in the conceptualizing stages, at the moment. I have already discussed this with my partner, he understands my concerns and agrees that we might want to look into this ASAP to determine where we stand. If we can obtain the patents first, we might be able to use that as leverage to obtain grant money for training and development for both inventions.

While I was thinking this through, I remembered a small project I did for a biology class years ago on terraforming Mars into an Earth-like and inhabitable planet by utilizing its own natural resources with a little bit of technological help from us to kick it off and get the process started. I am not sure if a process such as this is a patentable idea. Can one even patent such a process? Besides, it's not like as if people just come up with these kinds of ideas every day - except maybe in science fiction stories. However, the article that I based my project and presentation on was based on science and real world reality, not pie in the sky concepts. My professor OK'd the article and the report - and I ended up getting an A on the project. Even though I got some of the ideas from the inital article, I did add some realistic ideas of how to do exactly what my report proposed. I do think I still have the report somewhere in storage - though I don't think it's on disk. The article was from a science fiction magazine - though from the science discussion section - not from a story. This magazine is no longer in publication - Science Fiction Age. I do believe that it is possible to do what I proposed in that initial report, but it gives me ideas about moving foreward on that exact topic. A presentation would be in order - powerpoint all the way, baby! So, I now have another project peeking out wanting attention. I may as well add it to my outline list of topics.