Patent for CRISPR-Cas9: to be continued
The victory of the Broad Institute in the long struggle for a patent for the CRISPR-Cas9 genome editing method is not the end of the story
Marina Astvatsaturyan, Echo of Moscow
The analysis of the current moment is presented by Nature News (Heidi Ledford, Why the CRISPR patent verdict isn't the end of the story).
On February 15, the US Patent and Trademark Office (US Patent and Trademark Office) determined the owner of intellectual rights to the promising method of gene editing CRISPR-Cas9: the Broad Institute at Harvard University and MIT became the patent holder, and the patent application of the University of California at Berkeley (University of California in Berkeley), thus lost.
The confrontation has a five-year history: in 2012 Jennifer Doudna (Jennifer Doudna) from Berkeley and Emmanuelle Charpentier (Emmanuelle Charpentier), then working at the University of Vienna (University of Vienna), with colleagues described a scheme for using the CRISPR-Cas9 system to cut DNA in precisely specified places. In 2013, Feng Zhang from the Broad Institute with colleagues and another group from the same place showed how this method can be used to edit DNA in eurocyotic cells, such as plants, livestock and humans.
Berkeley employees filed a patent application earlier, but the Patent and Trademark Office recognized the priority of the Broad Institute, which was confirmed last week.
Meanwhile, the stakes in this game are high. The holder of a key patent can earn millions of dollars on the industrial application of the CRISPR–Cas9 system: the method has already significantly advanced genetic research, and scientists are using it to create disease-resistant livestock, as well as to develop new methods of treating human diseases. But, according to the Nature News columnist, the fight for patent rights to the CRISPR method will continue and there are four reasons for this (Heidi Ledford, Why the CRISPR patent verdict isn't the end of the story).
First: within the next two months, a group from Berkeley may appeal against the decision of the patent office. The only question here is how confident the applicants are that their patent, if granted, will cover most of the highly profitable applications of gene editing in eukaryotic cells. The Broad Institute's victory rests on a key difference: its patents stipulate the possibility of adapting CRISPR for use in eukaryotes, which is not in the Berkeley group's application.
The second way to continue the patent struggle is to transfer it to Europe, which is already taking place.
The third reason for extending the history: there are more than two sides in this struggle, there are claims for the right to commercial use of Cas9 enzyme in 763 applications in different countries.
And finally, the CRISPR method goes beyond the scope of accepted patents, because both academic and applied research is currently being conducted using other DNA-cutting enzymes other than Cas9.
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22.02.2017