Era in Patents

The 1970s

The decade personal computing left the lab. Intel's microprocessor rewired industry, Xerox PARC sketched the desktop, and ARPANET wired the first universities together. Genentech proved a bacterium could brew human insulin, while fiber optics and CT scanning quietly arrived. Patents from these years still anchor every screen, network, and biologic on the market today.

By year

1970 1971 1972 1973 1974 1975 1976 1977 1978 1979

Top patents · 10 ranked by influence

1970 — 1979

US 4063220 · 1977 · Xerox Corp

How Computers Share a Network Cable Without Crashing

US 4166152 · 1979 · Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing Co

The Post-it Note Adhesive — Invented as a Failure That Stuck Around

US 4064521 · 1977 · RCA Corp

Semiconductor device having a body of amorphous silicon

US 3541541 · 1970 · Stanford Research Institute

The Computer Mouse — Invented 30 Years Before Anyone Cared

US 3671542 · 1972 · EI Du Pont de Nemours and Co

Kevlar — The Fiber Five Times Stronger Than Steel, Invented by Accident

US 4009052 · 1977 · Exxon Research and Engineering Co

The First Rechargeable Lithium Battery — Built at an Oil Company

US 3789832 · 1974

MRI — The Imaging Machine That Detects Cancer Without Radiation

US 4136359 · 1979 · Apple Computer Inc

The Apple II — The First Personal Computer That Came With Color

US 3789410 · 1974 · US Department of Navy

Measuring Distance to a Radio Emitter from a Moving Vehicle

US 4081538 · 1978

Aldosterone antagonists

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