BioCentury
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Supreme Court struggles with gene patents

April 16, 2013 12:41 AM UTC

U.S. Supreme Court Justices appeared to struggle to find middle ground between completely upholding or rejecting U.S. patents issued to Myriad Genetics Inc. (NASDAQ:MYGN) covering the breast cancer 1 early onset (BRCA1) and BRCA2 genes. The court is reviewing a 2-1 decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit that said composition and method claims in the patents are valid under Section 101 of the Patent Act. The patents are being challenged by the Association for Molecular Pathology, which is represented by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) (see BioCentury, Aug. 8, 2011).

In oral arguments on Monday, several justices expressed skepticism that isolated DNA fragments are patentable, but they seemed to agree with the U.S. Solicitor General's contention that creation of cDNA represents an invention that could be patented. Justice Sonia Sotomayor stated that cDNA "is artificially created in the laboratory, so it's not found in nature" and is a "product of human invention." ...