1. Introduction The invention of radio, one of the most important inventions of the 20 th century is attributed to Guglielmo Marconi of Italy. Though it is disputed whether Nikola Tesla's patent on radio precedes that of Marconi, it is well-known that the first demonstration of radio transmission over several thousand miles was done by Marconi in the year 1901. There have been other claims of r...

Invention activities are structured tasks in which students create mathematical methods that attempt to capture deep properties of data (e.g., variability), prior to receiving instruction on canonical methods (e.g., mean deviation). While experiments have demonstrated the learning benefits of invention activities, the mechanisms of transfer remain unknown. We address this question by evaluating...

This paper argues that many new production techniques have been developed by a process called 'collective invention'. When firms collectively invent, they make available to their competitors the results of new plant designs so that their competitors can incorporate extensions of tliose designs into new facilities they build. The paper analyses the implications of this behavior for the rate and ...

A patent gives a patent holder (the “patentee”) the exclusive right to make, use, import, and sell his or her invention. The quid pro quo for obtaining a patent on an invention is disclosing in the patent how to make and use the invention. For this reason, a patent application must contain a detailed disclosure that teaches how to make and use the invention. Normally, this disclosure consists o...

We describe the design of the Invention Coach, an intelligent, exploratory learning environment (ELE) to support Invention, an exploratory learning activity. Our design is based on a two-pronged approach. Our own study of naturalistic teacher guidance for paper-based Invention uncovered phases in the Invention process. Prior research on the mechanisms of learning with Invention activities revea...