Professor Patterson teaches and writes about antitrust law, patent law, Internet law, and contracts. He received his BS and MS degrees from The Ohio State University, both in electrical engineering, and he performed engineering research, primarily in robotics, for ten years. He then obtained his JD degree from Stanford Law School and practiced law at Choate, Hall & Stewart in Boston, concentrating on antitrust litigation and patent prosecution. Subsequently he clerked for Justice John M. Greaney on the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts and was a Bigelow Fellow at the University of Chicago Law School before joining Fordham in 1995.

Professor Patterson has been a visiting professor at Bocconi University in Milan and at the University of Navarra in Pamplona, and a visiting fellow at the European University Institute. His current research focuses on the antitrust treatment of informational issues. He is a registered patent attorney.