[IP Hot Topics Podcast] Innovation Conversations: Walter Isaacson, Part 1
Clinton: SCOTUS Myriad Genetics Decision 'Terrific'
Can You Patent Human Genes? ACLU Says No
Yours, Mine and Ours (not yet!): An Update on the Patentability of Human Genes
On March 25, the Federal Circuit issued an opinion in In re Board of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior Univ., No. 2020-1288 (Fed. Cir. Mar. 25, 2021), affirming the Patent Trial and Appeal Board’s rejection of the...more
The transcendental conundrum in patent law in these times is how to overcome the misinterpretation of the Supreme Court's decisions on patent eligibility law by district courts and the Federal Circuit. That these courts...more
Addressing the issue of patent eligibility under §101, the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit reversed a district court, explaining that the method of preparation claims at issue are not directed to a...more
It was recently reported that China had successfully cloned a 12-year old schnauzer — the most recent of over 20 dog breeds successfully cloned by the nation so far. "Doudou" the schnauzer was cloned through somatic cell...more
In Part I, I explained some general criteria for laws of nature, considering the prototypes of Newton's laws and Einstein's E=mc2. Now I'll turn to whether there are laws of nature in biology. Biological generalizations,...more
2016 has been a year of IP changes and these changes have had an effect upon biotechnology as well as trade secrets. Patents: Will the U.S. Supreme Court Grant Cert. In Ariosa v. Sequenom? Ariosa v. Sequenom was...more
The biotechnology and life sciences community has voiced broad support for Sequenom’s recent request that the Supreme Court review the Federal Circuit’s decision holding Sequenom’s diagnostic fetal DNA patent ineligible under...more
Arguing that the current state of the law weakens the patent system and poses a danger to life science innovators, biotechnology company, Sequenom, Inc., has filed a writ of certiorari with the U.S. Supreme Court, asking the...more
Biotechnology. For many, the mere mention of the word stirs up a thought of people in white lab coats working in underground bunkers trying to create superhuman mutant weapons, with beakers of green goo bubbling in the...more
In Genetic Techs Ltd v Merial LLC (Fed. Cir., April 8, 2016), the Federal Circuit invalidated yet another diagnostic patent for failing to satisfy 35 U.S.C. § 101 on the ground that the claims recite nothing more than a law...more
Striking another blow against patent eligibility in the field of biotechnology, the Federal Circuit agreed with the district court that methods that use “junk DNA” to detect genetic variations lack patent eligibility under 35...more
Sequenom filed its anticipated petition for certiorari today for Supreme Court review of the Federal Circuit's decision in Ariosa v. Sequenom. The petition advises the Court that it "should take this opportunity to provide...more
Last week, Appellee Natera, Inc. filed its response to the petition for rehearing en banc filed by Appellants Sequenom, Inc. and Sequenom Center for Molecular Medicine, LLC in August (see "Sequenom Requests Rehearing En...more
Clearly the High Court has given an answer to a question, but was that question the one we anticipated? That in itself is an open question!...more
Like the United States Supreme Court, the High Court of Australia has determined that Myriad’s patents directed to purified and isolated DNA molecules encoding the BRCA genes are unpatentable. Indeed, the Australian Court...more
In Ariosa Diagnostics Inc. v. Sequenom Inc., 788 F.3d 1371 (Fed. Cir. 2015), a Federal Circuit panel held that Sequenom Inc.’s prenatal diagnosis patent claims patent ineligible subject matter under the two-step test of Mayo...more
With its recent (June 12, 2015) decision in Ariosa v. Sequenom, the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit affirmed the Northern District of California’s broad interpretation of the U.S. Supreme Court’s Prometheus v. Mayo...more
The Federal Circuit Friday held in Ariosa Diagnostics, Inc. v. Sequenom, Inc. that Sequenom’s patent directed toward its MaterniT21 test—involving methods of detecting and using cell-free fetal DNA— was invalid for lack of...more
On December 17, 2014, the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals found that certain claims relating to Myriad’s BRCA1 genetic test for breast and ovarian cancer were invalid under 35 U.S.C. § 101 as being ineligible for patent...more
The Supreme Court decision last year on June 13, 2013 in Association of Molecular Pathology v. Myriad Genetics may have been a watershed moment for the biotechnology industry. So far the effects have been hard to detect, but...more
In one of the first district court decisions applying the U.S. Supreme Court’s new Myriad patent-eligibility standard, the Northern District of California held that diagnostic claims containing only conventional and existing...more
A patent issued to 23andMe, Inc. last month has created some controversy, and in response, the biotech company, based in Mountain View, California, has posted its side of the story on the 23andMe blog. The patent, U.S....more
The United States Supreme Court recently ruled that genes or other naturally-occurring pieces of DNA are patent ineligible subject matter in Association for Molecular Pathology, et al. v. Myriad Genetics, Inc., et al. No....more
As we all know by now, the Supreme Court last month decided that isolated genes are not eligible for patenting. Although seemingly drawing a clear-cut distinction between DNA molecules having the same sequence as that which...more
The decision by the U.S. Supreme Court that isolated DNA having the same sequence as naturally-occurring DNA is not patentable subject matter is inconsistent with the position of the European Patent Office and Japanese law....more