UC Berkeley seeks interference on Broad's CRISPR patents

The University of California Berkeley filed a patent interference request with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) related to 10 patents held by the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard covering CRISPR- Cas9 ( CRISPR-associated protein 9) gene editing technology. Broad spokesperson Paul Goldsmith said the USPTO is reviewing the request and has not yet granted an interference.

Although the Broad Institute holds the first patents covering CRISPR-Cas9, UC Berkeley Professor Jennifer Doudna was first to file a patent application for the technique. Doudna's application, filed in March 2013, has priority dating back to a provisional patent application filed in May 2012. Broad and MIT professor Feng Zhang's first provisional filing was in December 2012. ...