Cluster Maps show the patent items displayed in time and grouped by a specific attribute. They provide a quick "time dimension" slice view of the patent attribute being investigated- e.g. Technology Area by Patent Class:

In this example the patent items have been grouped by their U.S. Patent and Trademark Office Main Patent Classes, with the top ten classes by number of patent items in descending order starting from the top of the map.

The horizontal (x-axis) is time. Each box on this map is a U.S. patent or published U.S. application. The boxes are oriented in time with the left edge of each patent box aligned with the patent's issue date (in the case of an issued patent) or the application publication date (in the case of a published patent application).

The horizontal lines separate each of the classes.

The patent items that are not in one of the top 10 classes are grouped at the bottom of the map

Click on the map to launch a "live Interactive Map" in a new window. On the Interactive Map you can access the Patent Detail Menu by right clicking on a patent box.