It’s Unanimous: Natural DNA Is Not Patentable

The Supreme Court on Thursday unanimously ruled that human DNA cannot be patented.

Synthetic DNA, unlike naturally occurring DNA, can be patented, however. Isolating the gene and altering it, the court found, does not allow the company to patent the gene.

Utah-based Myriad, which holds two gene patents for breast and ovarian cancer, argued that the extracted human genes were chemically altered and therefor distinct and patentable.

You can read the court's opinion, written by Justice Clarence Thomas, here. Justice Antonin Scalia joined in part and filed a concurring opinion.

Thomas notes that there is always a "delicate balance" when discussing patents:

The rule against patents on naturally occurring things has limits, however. Patent protection strikes a delicate balance between creating "incentives that lead to creation, invention, and discovery" and "imped[ing] the flow of information that might permit, indeed spur, invention."

Hard work, Thomas writes, does not mean the company deserves a patent:

In this case, by contrast, Myriad did not create anything. To be sure, it found an important and useful gene, but separating that gene from its surrounding genetic material is not an act of invention.

In arguing the case, Myriad may have focused on the wrong part of genome science:

Nor are Myriad's claims saved by the fact that isolating DNA from the human genome severs chemical bonds and thereby creates a nonnaturally occurring molecule. Myriad's claims are simply not expressed in terms of chemical composition, nor do they rely in any way on the chemical changes that result from the isolation of a particular section of DNA.

See the article here:
It's Unanimous: Natural DNA Is Not Patentable