Christopher Cotropia

Christopher Cotropia specializes in patent law, intellectual property law, and empirical legal studies. His research is published in the American Law and Economics Review, Journal of Empirical Studies, Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization, Northwestern Law Review, Research Policy, Texas Law Review, UCLA Law Review, and many others. He is also the co-author of Patent Law: An Open-Access Casebook. Professor Cotropia has testified before the United States Senate Judiciary Committee, Federal Trade Commission, and the United States International Trade Commission on patent law issues.

Before coming to GW, Professor Cotropia served as the Dennis I. Belcher Professor of Law at the University of Richmond School of Law. He also served as the C.J. Morrow Research Associate Professor of Law at Tulane University School of Law.

Professor Cotropia graduated with honors and distinction from Northwestern University, where he majored in both Computer Engineering and Electrical Engineering. He attended the University of Texas School of Law, where he was an Articles Editor on the Texas Intellectual Property Law Journal. Professor Cotropia also studied International and Comparative Intellectual Property Law at Queen Mary & Westfield College’s Centre for Commercial Law Studies. After law school, he clerked for the Honorable Alvin A. Schall of the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit and practiced law at Fish & Richardson’s Washington, DC office.

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