The US Patent Office has opened a review of patents and patent applications concerning CRISPR technology. The legal process could result in rights being transferred between the disputing parties, the University of California (UC), Berkeley and the Broad Institute of Cambridge, Massachusetts. So far the parties haven't been able to reach a truce. The Patent Office previously ruled that the Broad Institute's achievement of making CRISPR work inside human cells was a separate invention to that of UC Berkeley, which first achieved gene-editing in a test tube. The ruling enabled Broad to retain its key patents. In an interview with Nature, UC's David Baltimore, who led the team at UCL that made the discovery, said he hoped it would be possible for other scientists to use the technique as well.
The US Patent Office has opened a review of patents and patent applications concerning CRISPR technology. The legal process could result in rights being transferred between the disputing parties, the University of California (UC), Berkeley and the Broad Institute of Cambridge, Massachusetts. The Patent Office previously ruled that the Broad Institute's achievement of making CRISPR work inside human cells was a separate invention to that of UC Berkeley, which first achieved gene-editing in a test tube. The ruling enabled Broad to retain its key patents. In an interview with Nature, UC's David Baltimore, who led the team at UCL that made the discovery, said he hoped it would be possible for other scientists to use the technique as well.