The
person having ordinary skill in the art (often abbreviated
PHOSITA in the
United States), the
person of ordinary skill in the art, the
skilled addressee,
person skilled in the art or simply the
skilled person is a
legal fiction found in many
patent laws throughout the world. This fictional person is considered to have the normal skills and knowledge in a particular technical field, without being a genius. He or she mainly serves as a reference for determining, or at least evaluating, whether an
invention is
non-obvious or not (in U.S. patent law), or involves an
inventive step or not (in
European patent laws). If it would have been obvious for this fictional person to come up with the invention while starting from the
prior art, then the particular invention is considered not
patentable.