Reversing a previous decision by a US District Court that declared gene patenting to be invalid, the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) recently ruled in opposition, declaring that certain gene variants are supposedly unnatural and can thus be legally patented by biotechnology companies.
Myriad Genetics & Laboratories, a molecular diagnostics company out of Salt Lake City, Ut., had filed patents for BRCA1 and BRCA2, two genes allegedly linked to predicting breast cancer risk. Because the company had supposedly omitted certain so-called noncoding "junk" regions from the genes, Myriad alleged that these genes were their own intellectual property.
