[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
The "genome revolution" over the past 30 years has resulted in the elucidation of several species, both domesticated (see, e.g., "The Genetic Basis of Coat Variation in Dogs"; "Further and More Detailed Study of Domestic Cat...more
The domestic cat has been the subject of much study, recently involving its genetic structure, genomic DNA sequence, and comparisons with other felines. The first such study was published in 2014, when an international...more
The advent of technology making feasible elucidation of whole genomic sequencing over the past 30 years has led to reports of many if not most important or interesting animal genomes (including the most celebrated results of...more
On July 13, 2021, Prime Medicine, a Massachusetts biotech company developing next generation gene editing technology, emerged from stealth mode with $315 million in financing. The financing includes a $115 million Series A...more
The humble peach has been the inspiration for pies, album titles, independent movies, and a fictional woman's baseball team, but is also an important food species, yielding 24.5 million tons globally in 2018. Like all plant...more
The giraffe is the tallest extant terrestrial animal, and its iconic long neck (6 feet) provides advantages for foraging for food and detecting predators on the veldt over long distances. As a consequence, however, the...more
Turns Out, Early Humans Not the Cause of Woolly Rhinoceros Extinction - Paleogenomics (the use of genetic analysis of DNA contained in ancient remains) has developed rapidly since Svante Pääbo first showed that DNA could...more
One of the signal public health achievements/victories of the 20th Century is the eradication of smallpox (variola virus, VARV) announced by the World Health Organization (WHO) in 1980; it has been estimated that smallpox...more
As the COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted life throughout the world this spring, bats have been a prominent feature in news stories and recriminations about how the pandemic started (and being blamed even more than happenings in...more
The domesticated chicken, Gallus gallus domesticus, is the most numerous domestic animal and a preferred source of animal protein. Chicken domestication has been thought (based on traditional measures) to have arisen in the...more
The human tendency to identify with tribes of "like" humans (related by family, place of origin, or religion, among other bases) was perverted during the Twentieth Century (and in some places remains so today) into the idea...more
Gregor Mendel's great good fortune (or extraordinary prescience) was that he chose for the traits he used to illustrate the genetic control of inheritance (despite having no inkling of its mechanism) traits in his pea plants...more
Durum wheat, Triticum turgidum L. ssp. durum (Desf.) Husn., used principally for pasta production, was derived from wild emmer wheat, T. turgidum ssp. dicoccoides (Körn. ex Asch. & Graebn.) Thell. from domesticated emmer...more
The orange clownfish, Amphiprion percula, is an important denizen of many reef systems (and, thanks to Disney, Pixar, and Ellen Degeneris, one of the most famous fishes since the Billy Bass). One of thirty species of...more
Many people of a certain age will remember their first awareness of the koala coming from a television commercial in the 1960's for an Australian airline ("I hate Qantas"). Thereafter, of course, zoos, like the San Diego Zoo...more
Invertebrate zoology is in many ways the most comprehensive survey course on biology, encompassing most multicellular life on the planet. (Indeed, the study of the Order Coleoptera alone, comprising the beetles, would...more