INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY

Genes Are Still Patentable, Federal Appeals Court Rules

An appellate court reinstated Myriad Genetics exclusive rights to research two cancer-linked genes, leaving others researching these genes out in the cold.

TECHNOLOGY AND THE LAW

Swartz “Steals” for Science

The indictment of internet activist Aaron Swartz for allegedly downloading 4.8 million articles from JSTOR under a guest account raises questions

PATENT RIGHTS

Supreme Court Rules in Favor of Transnational Corp. over Stanford University in Patent Case

The Supreme Court’s answer to the question of who owns the products of federally funded research highlights tensions within academic-industrial relationships in research and development.

PATENT REFORM

Patent Reform and the Progress of Innovation

Our patent system is in need of reform. Could the stars be aligned for a bipartisan triumph in this Congress?

GENOMICS

Court Rules that DNA Is Information, Not Intellectual Property

A lawsuit argued that patents owned by Myriad Genetics on two genes connected to breast and ovarian cancer stunt genetic research and limit access to health care for women. The ruling said that genes can’t be patented.

Green Light for Gene Patent Lawsuit

A U.S. District Court judge ruled Monday that a gene patent lawsuit filed against the Patent and Trademark Office could move forward. At issue are patents exclusively licensed by Myriad Genetics for the BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes. Mutations of the [...]

INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY

Do Gene Patents Hurt Research?

Controversies over gene patents often ignore the lack of evidence that they impede basic research. The more important concern may be the negative impact of the push to commercialize science.

Roundup: ACLU Sues Over Breast Cancer Gene Patents

The American Civil Liberties Union filed suit Tuesday against the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, Myriad Genetics, and the University of Utah, arguing that patents for the BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes are invalid. Mutations in the two genes are responsible [...]

INNOVATION CLUSTERS

Time for a More Open Approach?

“Open innovation” challenges the assumptions made by university technology transfer offices about maximizing the value of their intellectual property.

INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY

How Genes Are Like Plutonium

Patenting unmodified genes rewards discovery, not invention. We must prohibit the process and invalidate all claims to unmodified genes to facilitate more open science.

Weiss On Patent Reform in Boston Globe

The backlog at the United States Patent Office is 1 million applications long. This means that it takes almost 33 months for examiners to decide up or down on an application’s status. For sectors like communications where innovation moves at [...]

Patent Reform 101

Inventions are being created at an ever-increasing pace and have grown increasingly complex, but the rules governing patents have not seen substantial change in decades. As a result, the system is bogged down, hampering investment and job creation. Here’s how to fix things.

Issue 2: Science’s Troubled Legacy

In the new print edition: Developing Regional Centers of Innovation, Tackling the Challenge of Patent Reform, and Government Contracting Run Amok.

PATENT REFORM

Tackling the Challenge of Patent Reform

Scientific research and technological development have long been mainstays of American economic and military strength. Today more than ever, the global economic crisis and the prospect of a long and deep U.S. recession call for a reinvigoration of America’s scientific, engineering, and manufacturing enterprises.

LEGAL POLICY

Patent Trolls Erode the Foundation of the U.S. Patent System

By far, the most significant and destabilizing change in the patent environment since 2003 has been the dramatic increase in the growth, financing, and patent acquisitions of so called non-practicing entities, or “patent trolls.”

INNOVATION ECONOMICS

Innovation Policies for the 21st Century

The new administration must provide proper patent incentives and thoughtful financial support for science and technology to germinate in communities around the country.

Enabling Economic Recovery Through Innovation

We will release the Fall/Winter 2008-2009 print edition of Science Progress next Monday, January 12. This issue will feature entirely new content on regional centers of innovation, patent reform, and government contracting of scientific and technological work.

EU Rejects Stem Cell Patent Applications

At the end of last week, Reuters reported that the European Patent Office issued its final ruling rejecting a patent application for the stem cell technology based on the work of James Thomson of the University of Wisconsin. Filed in 1995 by the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation, the patent, according to the EPO release “describes a method for obtaining embryonic stem cell cultures from primates, including humans.”

Better Patents Through Crowdsourcing

Want to clean up the patent mess? Start by admitting government can’t know everything. Then put the public on the task.

In Search of Balance for Intellectual Property Protections

The Senate Finance Committee revisited the problems in international intellectual property rights protection without offering solutions or new points to consider. The conflict between IP protection and the benefits of sharing drugs and technology with developing nations will become even more pertinent as clean energy technologies are perfected.