Stem Cell Patent Torpedoes Research

g8orade writes: "This story says the University of Winsconsin owns patents that may prevent anyone spending that federal money soon. "As they carry out President Bush's plan for government financing of embryonic stem cell studies, federal health officials confront a daunting challenge: U.S. patent 6,200,806, a claim to the human embryonic stem cell." Originally in the NYT, this is a link to the not free account-requiring Charlotte Observer."

Comments

I still don't get it

[mac123]

I continue to call the "need" for federal funding.

The stem cells that would be used are covered by a seemingly comprehensive patent by UW.

Univ. of Wis. has given exclusive rights to Geron (a company).

Geron will own anything done with these stem cells, including any "cures" that are discovered.

Geron is (presumably) willing to invest money (and already has) in the research in order to make money from this.

Why do we need federal funding of this? It seems like transferring taxpayer funds to the bottom line of hugebiotechcorp.com

Re:I still don't get it

[KahunaBurger]

Why do we need federal funding of this? It seems like transferring taxpayer funds to the bottom line of hugebiotechcorp.com

And this is news to you why? OK, sarcasm aside, you know that the US pours money every single year into different kinds of research. And private foundations and individuals pour another few million into "aids research" or "cancer research" or other focused causes. Then government and publicly funded hospitals use their resources to help with drug trials. Have you ever wondered why you never hear a pharm company say "we've decided to release this drug from our patent early because of the huge government and public investment we made it with."?

The patent likely won't effect which biotech company makes a mint off other peoples pain and says "but we paid all this research and development (with your tax dollors)". Stem cells exist, the patent is likely on a particular extraction or culturing method (sorry, don't have time to look for sure before work). But the fact that all this money would eventually lead to propriatory drugs and techniques being sold back to us as the fruits of our wonderful free market was a given from the start.

And if /. is still around then we can listen to the libertarians tell us how any goverment interference in drug proffiteering would lead to no more investment and research like what gave us this wonderful stem cell work. Ugh.

Kahuna Burger

Further news...

[fluxrad]

Additionally, scientists working at the university of Wisconsin were reported as saying, later in the week:

"Since we have a patent on how stem cells may be used, we would advise every person living in the United States to either give us $25,000 or kill themselves, as we never explicitly said which babies could use them and which couldn't. Suck our balls!"

Furthermore, I would like to advise every American male that they are currently in violation of my own patent #2,3443,223 - "Ballzack." And, I must demand immediate licensing payment for posession or use of "Ballzack" or anyone found to be in posession of "Ballzack" will have it seized. I will begin grabbing everyone's "Ballzack" upon non-payment beginning on the first of September.

Uh...

[Scoria]

The patent

by the isolation of ES cell lines from two primate species, the common marmoset (Callithrix jacchus) and the rhesus monkey (Macaca mulatta).

-- the patent It looks like he might have been looking to patent embryonic stem cells of those species of primates, not human stem cells.

Excuse me...

[JoeShmoe]

Say, Mr. Founding Father...what was that again about patents and copyrights providing a BENEFIT to society? Is this what was intended?

Seriously, I think I remember reading that Benjamin Franklin was against the concept of patents because he himself invented a new type of indoor stove (Franklin stove I'm guessing) that was much much safer than the other indoor stoves at the time, which cause deaths from fire and smoke inhilation. A company in England tried to patent the stove's design after it was in use in the colonies and Franklin saw that there could be potentially lifesaving advances that would be unavailable thanks to patents.

Imagine patents on seatbelts and airbags being used restrictively...like you could only get them or use them in Ford vehicles. AIDS vaccines are another key example. It is inexcusable that WIPO and other intellectual property organizations put corporate profit protection above human life.
benefit of society".

- JoeShmoe

RTFP

[werdna]

Where did you get the idea that the patent was directed to a naturally occuring cell? It isn't.

Re:RTFP

[werdna]

I wrote, and you have not contradicted the proposition, that the patent is not directed to a naturall occuring cell. Unless you consider the term "in vitro" to relate to a natural occurence, none of your whining is responsive or on point.

Re:RTFP

[werdna]

how, exactly, is a "primate embryonic stem cell" not a naturally occuring cell?

When you type shit like that, particularly in the view of the title of this thread, try to get it right, OK? RTFP suggests that you "Read the fine patent," not just scan the stupid title.

The answer to your question, exactly, is when the preparation (not the cell) is fabricated in vitro in a manner conforming with the patent claim and specification, in view of the prosecution history.

In particular, just to help you along before you err again, consider claim 1:

1. A purified preparation of pluripotent human embryonic stem cells which (i) will proliferate in an in vitro culture for over one year, (ii) maintains a karyotype in which the chromosomes are euploid and not altered through prolonged culture, (iii) maintains the potential to differentiate to derivatives of endoderm, mesoderm, and ectoderm tissues throughout the culture, and (iv) is inhibited from differentiation when cultured on a fibroblast feeder layer.

I don't know how often preparations of stem cells for a year-long period in glass happen in nature where you live. In particular, where the year-long preparation is made so the cells maintain a karyotype in which the chromosomes are euploid and not altered through prolonged culture.

Perhaps its my inexperience with such things, but the aforesaid sounds pretty man-made to me.

Re:RTFP

[werdna]

Since you asked, I'll summarize the colloquy:

The original post: How can anyone patent a naturaly occuring cell? This is getting way out of control

I responded: Where did you get the idea that the patent was directed to a naturally occuring cell? It isn't.

You wrote: you're exactly right. the patent isn't for the cell itself, it's basically just a patent on turning the stem cell into a part of the nervous system

Of the view that this remark had nothing to do with the original post or my response, I wrote:
I wrote, and you have not contradicted the proposition, that the patent is not directed to a naturall occuring cell. Unless you consider the term "in vitro" to relate to a natural occurence, none of your whining is responsive or on point.

Your response, amusingly: how, exactly, is a "primate embryonic stem cell" not a naturally occuring cell?

My reply: In particular, just to help you along before you err again, consider claim 1:

1. A purified preparation of pluripotent human embryonic stem cells which (i) will proliferate in an in vitro culture for over one year, (ii) maintains a karyotype in which the chromosomes are euploid and not altered through prolonged culture, (iii) maintains the potential to differentiate to derivatives of endoderm, mesoderm, and ectoderm tissues throughout the culture, and (iv) is inhibited from differentiation when cultured on a fibroblast feeder layer.

I don't know how often preparations of stem cells for a year-long period in glass happen in nature where you live. In particular, where the year-long preparation is made so the cells maintain a karyotype in which the chromosomes are euploid and not altered through prolonged culture.

Bringing us to your question: 1) where have i stated in this thread that the patent holders had a patent for the actual concept or existance stem cell? (a quote would suffice)

My answer: You never made that statement. I never said you did. You still haven't responded, on the merits, to the only proposition I have pursued in this thread: that the patent is not directed to a naturally occurring cell. It isn't. Q.E.D.

Good side vs. Bad Side

[ImaLamer]

This is what I'm worried about:

"In turn, the foundation has granted rights to a biotechnology company, Geron Corp. of Menlo Park, Calif., giving that company considerable say over who ultimately profits from stem cell therapies."

Of course you can't believe what other people are posting, no one is going to regulate sexual reproduction etc. The problem would be, who is going to be helped because of the research. Your local HMO and drug company is going to be helped way more than your Parkinsons striken mother.

More? Read on:

"I don't want people to see us as an 800-pound gorilla," Carl Gulbrandsen, the foundation's managing director, said. "We will work very hard with the government to make sure that there is access to this technology and that our patents are not an impediment to researchers."

Then why did you patent it in the first place? More? Read on:

"As far as experts know, the United States is the only nation to have issued a patent on human embryonic stem cells" [from the article]

Of course we are! And we'll be the first to reward a patent [if you read on, you are legally bound not to take my patent idea] for breathing in through your nose and out through your mouth!

And what tells me pro-life groups [Pat Robertson] will try to buy the patent holders out?

Seizing the patent

[mr100percent]

The government could 'seize' the patent (through due process of law) in the public interest. Any prior art in this case? Other universities could be ahead, they just haven't said anything for fear of controversy.

Or we could all say that patents suck, unless you patented something.

There is an alternative source

[Midnight Thunder]

Research at the Montreal Neurological Institute has revealed that there is an alternative source for stem cells. The source is from the skin of adult rodents, and they believe that this will also be possible with humans. The added advantage is that these stem cells would not be rejected when used in building organs for replacement.

Why bother with embryonic stem cells?

[bartyboy]

Non-embryonic stem cell production has been unveiled a few days ago. Not only is it not patented, it also puts to rest many moral issues associated with stem cells of embryonic origin.

So why would anyone keep using embryonic stem cells?

Patents save lives

[werdna]

Imagine patents on seatbelts and airbags being used restrictively...like you could only get them or use them in Ford vehicles.

Imagine that, indeed. As a matter of fact, there are a few gazillion patents covering every aspect of the field, and some of those patents dating back decades.

AIDS vaccines are another key example. It is inexcusable that WIPO and other intellectual property organizations put corporate profit protection above human life.

Nonsense. Patents make it possible for corporations to create life-saving technology and saves lives. Pharmaceutical companies raise capital from the marketplace for research and development and regulatory testing, not because shareholders are happy to volunteer funds for R&D, but because they hope the company will make a profit. If the company could not make a profit, the R&D and development wouldn't get done, and the products would be brought to market. If the company didn't have patents, competitors would simply free-ride on the R&D and compete with them using their own work. No profits, no product, no life saving drugs.

Life saving drugs, such as tetracycline and a host of antibiotics, leukemia fighting drugs, and lifestyle preserving drugs such as Prozac and many others are the product of, not deterred by, the patent system.

Re:Patents save lives

[ToLu the Happy Furby]

Nonsense. Patents make it possible for corporations to create life-saving technology and saves lives. Pharmaceutical companies raise capital from the marketplace for research and development and regulatory testing, not because shareholders are happy to volunteer funds for R&D, but because they hope the company will make a profit. If the company could not make a profit, the R&D and development wouldn't get done, and the products would be brought to market. If the company didn't have patents, competitors would simply free-ride on the R&D and compete with them using their own work. No profits, no product, no life saving drugs.

Life saving drugs, such as tetracycline and a host of antibiotics, leukemia fighting drugs, and lifestyle preserving drugs such as Prozac and many others are the product of, not deterred by, the patent system.

Of course you're right, so far as life-saving drugs are really developed solely by privately-financed R&D. The reality, however, is very different.

Indeed, a recent study found that, for the top 5 best-selling drugs currently on the market, fully 80% of the money which funded their development was put up not by the pharmacutical companies which own the patents, not by private investors, but by the federal government in the form of research grants. More generally (and for which I can find a link to back me up), between 70 and 90 percent of important drugs are developed with significant government help, and a whopping 38% of all health-care related R&D is financed by the federal government. (Government grants are heavily skewed towards basic research; thus we can expect that this displaces drug discovery research much more than eg. engineering type R&D for new technology in hospitals.) All the government gets back for their tremendous investment (other than a healthier society, which, of course, is their main goal), is a $50 patent fee.

Obviously pharmacuticals still spend a tremendous amount of capital and incur large risks to take the final steps to bring a drug to market and test its safety and efficacy. (The government grants go more to the basic research end of things.) Indeed, you are right in suggesting that the current "free-market" drug development system would completely collapse if pharmacutical companies did not have the monopoly profits of patents to cover their capital investments. Nor could the system survive without government grants at their current, tremendous levels; while the pharmacuticals are certainly not struggling to keep afloat at the moment, their profit rewards are generally commensurate to the risks they incur from the share of development they actually do finance.

What you should realize, however, is that the current system is not a free-market at all. It is so heavily subsidized as to transcend mere "corporate welfare"; instead it is really a huge socialist enterprise with a quasi-capitalist front-end tacked on. The solution, as impossible as it is obvious, is to remove the privatized delivery system and let the entire drug development pipeline be financed, and controlled, by government and academia. In other words, let science for the public good be run by scientists and the public, and not by businessmen.

Thing is, as every developed country in the world except the US has realized, our ethical conception of medicine inherently clashes with capitalist motives. There are only two ways for an entity to profit from offering health care:

1) by killing poor people.
2) by being a broad enough entity that it can reap the benefits of providing health care without charging for it.

#1 is obvious if you think about it for a while: if you charge the rate which the market will bear for live-saving treatments, then obviously some people will be unable to pay. If you think this does not go on in America today then you are very badly deluded.

#2 refers to the fact that having a healthy population is essential for economic growth and a stable society. However, hospitals and pharmacutical companies are not broad enough to benefit from the fact that healthy people can provide a net economic positive while sick or dead people cannot. Our current system has a cobbled-together kludge to fix this: most people's health costs are borne by their employer, who *does* reap (some of) the economic and social benefit of them being healthy.

The problem with this is that it only works for people who are currently employed in a job good enough to pay benefits. The 50 million uninsured in America are mainly young people--children, students, and those with entry level jobs. The economic and societal benefit they will provide later in their lives is often contingent on their remaining healthy today, but the current system can't recognize this.

This is without even getting into the problems of the very poor: of the one-in-five children under 5 years old who lives beneath the povery line; of the mentally ill homeless who could provide a positive benefit to society if they could only recieve treatment. (Less than 50% of those below the poverty line recieve Medicaid, and it rarely provides more than emergency room care; a full 36% are completely uninsured, and thus obviously unable to pay for any medical care whatsoever. Uninsured In America, pg. 22, very large pdf.)

The current system is completely broken, but it will take more than just patent reform to fix it

Re:Patents save lives

[werdna]

Yeah, that Jonas Salk sure was one corporate whore. And awful folks like Tishler, Conover and Sheehan, damn those antibiotics. Who needed them? I'm sure they would have made it to all those poor people eventually.

No doubt the profits of companies make some drugs unavailable to those who cannot afford them. That is why there are programs to provide medical care for the poor. That way, we can have both the virtues of the social product of the marketplace, and charity to boot.

My concern about these drugs is, however, what if they never existed at all?

Re:Patents save lives

[ToLu the Happy Furby]

Yeah, that Jonas Salk sure was one corporate whore. And awful folks like Tishler, Conover and Sheehan, damn those antibiotics. Who needed them? I'm sure they would have made it to all those poor people eventually.

The question is whether Salk et. al. would only have made their discoveries if their research was funded by a private company, as opposed to if they worked eg. at a research university and their research was funded by the university and government grants. I can't conceive of a reason why there would be any difference. I'm certainly not aware of any suggestion that Salk was motivated by the promise of monopoly patents rather than a desire to save millions of children's lives.

Now, the question you have to answer is this: what if Salk et. al. had their own companies, and prevented anyone else in the world from developing killed virus vaccines, or antibiotics, for the 17 year patent period? Back in the 50's, only the vaccines or antibiotics themselves were patentable. If invented today, the entire fields of killed virus vaccines and synthetic antibiotics would likely be signed off on by the USPTO.

By the by, you might be interested to know that Jonas Salk didn't patent the polio vaccine. Incidentally, he is a national hero.

By contrast, Lloyd Conover wasted 27 years of his life defending his tetracyclene patent in court. For his efforts, he got inducted into the USPTO Hall of Fame. (As were Tishler and Sheehan. Salk, as mentioned above, did not merit an invite.)

Incidentally, I had never heard of Lloyd Conover before in my life.

Article in the Capital Times (Madison, WI)

[LatJoor]

Here's a link to another story in the Capital Times (in Madison, Wisconsin). It puts more emphasis on interviews with researchers at the WARF. They claim that they are being very responsible with a patent, far more so than a private corporation would be if it owned the patent.

Unfortunately, the practice of licensing out research to private corporations has become common practice at the University of Wisconsin and other big research universities. Grad students sometimes do the work on research where the company gets to keep all IP gained from the research.

The problem is that the state keeps cutting our funds every year, so the university constantly has to search for new sources of funding. The administration sees private companies as a source for this research money. However, the gain from private grants, etc., is often offset by the expenses the UW incurs by building new facilities for this corporate-owned research. We still end up footing huge bills, but then the public doesn't own the result.

The researchers do have a point: at least a university research institution owns this patent, and they are concerned with the benefits of research, not profiteering. Many patents from university research now go to corporations. For example, earlier this year some UW researchers were given "free" access to Third Wave Technologies' proprietary Invader OS in exchange for promising Third Wave the right to develop any discoveries, which I assume means pursuing patents based on the UW researchers' work.

Things that shouldn't be patentable

[erroneus]

I'm thinking that among other things such as software, biological stuff like DNA and stem cells shouldn't be "patentable."

In the case of biological stuff, it can clearly be shown that the patent applicant didn't actually INVENT the stuff!! For crying out loud! Maybe I should patent "apples" or "bananas!" I didn't invent them but are they patented? Probably not... so I guess I should be the first and then I'll hold Del Monte and Chiquita hostage until they pay my royalties.

This patent crap is getting out of hand! I'm waiting for the day, and I think the day is getting too close too fast, when some company owns my left arm or something simply because I recieved some sort of graft from THEIR stem cells. Like, if I wanted to get a tattoo, I'd have to clear it through the board of directors for approval or something stupid like that. Who the hell is running the patent offices? It's getting ridiculous!

Re:Things that shouldn't be patentable

[cyberwench]

The problem is that this patent is a patent of process, not cells themselves. They've patented the method of turning one specific line of stem cells into other kinds of cells (which is the thing that makes stem cells so useful). Fortunately, with the advent of newer technologies, embryonic stem cells may no longer be needed. It's hard to say as of right now, though.

Otherwise, I agree with you. I was going to say that most of the patents getting through were on processes and not the cells themselves... but that doesn't explain how naturally occurring molecules (like those in medicinal plants) and genomes could be patented. "I found it, so now it's mine" just isn't a valid rationale for a patent, in my opinion. Patent what you _do_ with something, that's at least vaguely reasonable.

Power of Patents

[MobyDisk]

Let's not get confused here. Have a patent on concept X does not give me the right to stop all research on related topics X1 and X2. It prevents you from developing X, calling it your own, and selling it. The Thomas Edison foundation holds a patent on the light bulb, but that doesn't mean I cannot research LEDs, or new types of light bulbs.

Re:Power of Patents

[kcbrown]

No. Having a patent on X means that anyone who wishes to make X or use X must first obtain your permission (i.e., a license).

That means that if you own a patent on X, then anyone who needs to use X in order to do their research must obtain a license from you. It means that you can prevent their research if their research requires that they be able to use X.

U of W has, from what I've read, a patent on the growth and maintenance (among other things) of human stem cells. Obviously such growth and maintenance are required if you want to do research on them!

A patent isn't like a trademark. It's a monopoly on a product or a process or a method.

So if, for instance, you wish to research other ways of growing stem cells, you still have to either obtain a license from U of W, obtain stem cells from someone who has licensed the patent, or obtain them from somewhere outside the country, since you need stem cells to experiment with. In short, this patent is a roadblock in front of stem cell research in general.

Because its role can be only to hinder research and development, this patent should be ruled as unconstitutional as it blatently flies in the face of the Constitutional purpose of patents.
Too bad only laws can be ruled unconstitutional...

Blessings

[fizban]

This is a GOOD THING. By having a *public institution* own the patents to ALL the stem cell lines, it's going to be MUCH easier for researchers to have access. Despite what many people think, patents actually can be a good thing. It's just we've seen them so many times abused by PRIVATE organizations. Instead of spouting off the normally uneducated response that most of the 15-year-old Slashdot readers here have, try thinking about the issue first.

in the NYT, this is a link to the not free account-requiring Charlotte Observer.

I find it extremely ironic that the people who complain about signing up for accounts at the NYT still have accounts here at Slashdot. I mean, what's the damn difference? I could understand this statement coming from an Anonymous poster... The uneducated hypocritical Slashdot reader rears its ugly head again. Mod me down or flame me all you like, but you know its true.

Re:Blessings

[Doppleganger]

I find it extremely ironic that the people who complain about signing up for accounts at the NYT still have accounts here at Slashdot. I mean, what's the damn difference?

Sure, this is offtopic, but..

The difference is simple, really. Here at slashdot, you are not forced to give up your privacy in order to see the content. Even when you register for an account, you don't have to give away anything other than your email address, and that is only for passwords. Places that force you to give information, on the other hand, obviously place extra value on knowing who you are - value that they can sell to other people.

Personally, I think my privacy is worth a lot more than the amount it should/would cost to view the content on those kinds of sites if they were pay-per-view. You may not.. *shrug*

So what has everyone done?

[Lumpy]

when issues like this come up, and everyone here is pretty much agast at some stupid patent or law, what do we do? I mean other than whine and moan here about it. How many of you write an email to president@whitehouse.gov? how many take an ounce of effort and figure out the email of your congressman or house of represenataive member and then email them? I wont mention actually writing a real letter and mailing it, as most everyone here is either too lazy or cheap to do such a thing. but instead of whining how about actually being a member of society? we as a collective can and do crash servers on a regular basis. but do we take one bit of effort to write a letter that sounds like it was writen by someone that actually passed 10th grade and send it to someone who does have the power to change the law/problem? no way.

I dare you, I dare all of you. to write an email to the president and vice president, voicing your concern that his important decision is being controlled by some un-american legislators in a wisconsin college. And you as a voting american citizen (or as a forign interested party) would like to know what he is going to do about it.

Dont use L33t or swear every 3 words like an illiterate turd.

I'll bet that none of you have the guts or even brain power to do it. (Yes this last line is an intentional troll... as it seems that someone has to slap the slashdot collective in the face to get it's attention)

Re:Patents save lives...but do they save enough?

[JoeShmoe]

As a matter of fact, there are a few gazillion patents

Please read what I said. I did not say "imagine if there were patents" because I know there are patents on practically every engineering advance. I said what if they were used restrictively. What if Ford developed seatbelts, Honda came up with safety glass, and Volvo invented air bags? Well then you, dear consumer, would have the joy of choosing whether you died in a crash from being thrown from your vehicle, bleeding to death from severe lacerations, or internal bleeding from impacting the steering column.

Instead we have different makes of cars that have all three...moreso there are even governmental laws that say you MUST have these things to sell a car in the United States. Now, if the cost of licensing these patents were prohibitive, I highly doubt we would have these situations. While I'm not sure of the exact mechanism, I'm sure there are some trade organizations who take responsability for cross-licensing and pooling patents much like computer manufacturers do.

Patents make it possible for corporations to create life-saving technology

Now let me address this...I don't think companies should be asked to eat the cost of R&D even though in an ideal world, life-saving advances would be funded by charities for the sole purpose of ending a problem and not making money. But this is not an ideal world so I can accept that investors are getting together to fund research into some drug that will provided a benefit, perhaps save lives.

But here is where the little simple model you outline breaks down...the patent system does not draw a distinction between someone who invents a new widgit that, while making people happy, is essentially a luxurty and someone who invents a new widgit that saved lives. How much should someone be allowed to profit off the second situation?

Pharmaceutical companies don't just recover their R&D costs. They don't just double their initial investment. They invest millions and make billions. The 17-year or whatever lifespan of a patent is a money-printing machine when it comes to things people MUST (not just would like) to purchase.

In the extreme case, a company could find a cure for cancer. Auction one dose of the drug per month to the highest bidder. What would be the result? Cancer-ridden billionaires would live into their 90s while kids get shuttled off to orphanages because their hard workin' mama got breast cancer at age 30. Could anyone possibly argue that this situation is any better than not having that cure in the first place?

As another example...I recently visited my grandparents and found them lying in a room with the shades drawn, damn washcloths on their foreheads with a fan blowing over a pan of water to form some sort of evaporative cooler. They were afraid if they used the air conditioning they wouldn't be able to afford their power bills. So they sat there in 90-degree heat with 85% humidity. Why? So a power producer in the midwest can make take a 500% profit increase to its giddy shareholders.

The power crisis in California was caused by moron buerocrats who did what the lobbiest told them. Now we have a big mess and I understand that we are going to have to take responability for it. But in the meantime should anyone be allowed to profit from misery?

Maybe the fault lies in our corporate system for rewarding financial gain at all costs. Maybe the fault lies in the fact that when we put on the shareholders mask we gets to throw away our moral compass and sue our board if they don't move in for the kill. Regardless, it is going to have to change if things keep going like this.

There are legislators in California that want to see to it that energy companies get capped at 200% profit and are forced to return anything above that. Likewise, shouldn't pharamaceutical companies have a similar cap?

If the goal of the patent is to promote development by securing financial gain...then why don't we have a patent system based not on time (which is completely arbitrary) but on finances? As soon as you have made 200% return on your investment then society gets to benefit as well. I'm not saying this needs to be done for every patent, but there should definitely be some consideration given to patents that can affect the health of a society.

There's a big difference between some fat cat sitting on a pile of money because he invented the next Cabbage Patch/Tickle Me Elmo/Kirby and a fat cat sitting on a pile of money while people starve because poor farmers can only afford to buy a single generation of patented non-reproducing seeds.

- JoeShmoe

A serious problem

[mdw2]

One of the most serious problems we have today with the patent office is this: the allowing of patenting of discoveries. Discoveries are not inventions, no one invented the stem cell, they simply found it. This is the same mindset that allows companies to patent parts of the human genetic code. I believe we have bigger issues to worry about with the patent office than software.

Bummer...

[Greyfox]

Looks like Reeves is going to have to wait another 17 years before getting so much as a chance to walk again.

Sorry, dude!

Limited Differentiation

[cyberwench]

The only problem with this so far is that while the skin stem cells do differentiate into multiple types of cells, so far they haven't been able to get quite the range that you can with embryonic stem cells. It's quite possible that they may be able to differentiate them into more cells as they continue work along these lines. They have, however, ended up with some of the most important ones for research.

My question is... if they don't patent it, how long will it be until someone else does? There's lots of money in stem cell research. That's good in some respects (more research is good!) and bad in others (more money to hire patent lawyers!).

Re:Limited Differentiation

[cyberwench]

I think you misunderstand me. They haven't been able to get skin stem cells to differentiate in vitro into as many types of cells as they have been able to differentiate from embryonic stem cells in vitro. This is something that the researchers on this project stated quite clearly when they released their paper.

They may be able to get the skin cells to differentiate into more types, it's just they haven't managed to do it yet. However, some of the most important cells for research are currently able to be derived from skin stem cells. So, while it's not a complete replacement for embryonic stem cells, it is close.

If this patent holds water...

[Boone^]

Looks like I won't have to be donating $$ to my alma mater anytime soon. :)

Let's Go Red!

What the CLAIMS say

[yerricde]

The only thing in a patent that holds force of law is the list of claims. I'll excerpt here:

1. A purified preparation of pluripotent human embryonic stem cells which (i) will proliferate in an in vitro culture for over one year, (ii) maintains a karyotype in which the chromosomes are euploid and not altered through prolonged culture, (iii) maintains the potential to differentiate to derivatives of endoderm, mesoderm, and ectoderm tissues throughout the culture, and (iv) is inhibited from differentiation when cultured on a fibroblast feeder layer.

In other words, the only practical way to maintain a stem cell line.

9. A method of isolating a pluripotent human embryonic stem cell line, comprising the steps of isolating a human blastocyst; isolating cells from the inner cell mass of the blastocyte of (a); plating the inner cell mass cells on embryonic fibroblasts, wherein inner cell mass-derived cell masses are formed; dissociating the mass into dissociated cells; replating the dissociated cells on embryonic feeder cells; selecting colonies with compact morphologies and cells with high nucleus to cytoplasm ratios and prominent nucleoli; and culturing the cells of the selected colonies to thereby obtain an isolated pluripotent human embryonic stem cell line.

This method of getting at the stem cells looks pretty obvious to anyone who has ever studied the field.

I guess this patent will focus U.S. researchers on getting stem cells from other places.

New York Times Link

[Alien54]

Here is the Link to the NY Times article

Seems like there is a bunch of infighting going on

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Look at the claims...

[Artagel]

Let's look at the claims, the part of the patent that defines the legal rights. The first claim is...

1. A purified preparation of pluripotent human embryonic stem cells which (i) will proliferate in an in vitro culture for over one year, (ii) maintains a karyotype in which the chromosomes are euploid and not altered through prolonged culture, (iii) maintains the potential to differentiate to derivatives of endoderm, mesoderm, and ectoderm tissues throughout the culture, and (iv) is inhibited from differentiation when cultured on a fibroblast feeder layer.

You can read the patent to find out what the terms mean. If a stem cell line does not have all of the features above, it doesn't infringe. A short-lived stem cell line might have been a practical way around this patent before President Bush restricted federal funding for research involved with making more stem cell lines.

Prior Art!

[NoMoreNicksLeft]

I haave something on the order of 50 million pieces of evidence, and I encourage others to submit theirs, too. There is a high likelyhood that stem cells can be found in my fat tissue, skin, heart, brain tissue, and at various other places throughout my body. Since circumstances cleary show that I must have had these for nearly three decades, I don't see how this patent is valid. As a matter of fact, if I had had the foresight to patent them myself, back in '74, my patent would have already expired.

I've spent a great deal of my life developing and growing these stem cells, often at great nutritional cost to myself, and I would be apalled if the USPTO granted exclusive rights to some snotty little thief who thinks that they can just steal it out from under me.

Re:Patents save lives...but do they save enough?

[werdna]

Please read what I said. I did not say "imagine if there were patents" because I know there are patents on practically every engineering advance. I said what if they were used restrictively. What if Ford developed seatbelts, Honda came up with safety glass, and Volvo invented air bags?

That's what I'm trying to tell you. You seem to be suggesting that this isn't so. You are mistaken, for that pretty much describes the status quo. Really, you should check out the U.S. patent database on patents issued to the big three for automotive safety. Yet the parade of horribles never happened.

Why doesn't Ford keep an exclusive on seminal safety technology? How come not only one company has safety braking? Why don't more companies use their patents to maintain monopoly protection, rather than license them to third parties, indeed even their competitors?

Its the economy, stupid. The bottom line is, you need a patent to give you almost complete ownership of a market, not a market niche, before it is profitable to use it solely for monopoly purposes. And you need that market to have no real competitive alternatives, something like Xerox and Polaroid had for a brief time. Otherwise, there are almost ALWAYS far more profitable uses that can be made of a patent: royalty generation, cross-licensing to avoid further R&D and focusing on your core competencies to compete in a marketplace. Even in aerospace and other high-tech businesses, cross-marketing and licensing is the norm.

Monopoly rents are hard to collect. For the most time, patents act quite efficiently, in the economic sense, to assure that the marketplace gets the goods at a credible price.

Re:Patents save lives...but do they save enough?

[werdna]

Pharmaceutical companies don't just recover their R&D costs. They don't just double their initial investment. They invest millions and make billions. The 17-year or whatever lifespan of a patent is a money-printing machine when it comes to things people MUST (not just would like) to purchase.

Hmmm.. 10,000% profits, huh? I better get myself some more Pharm stocks. I had no idea. Let me check some of the books.

No, it doesn't quite work out at the end of the day. No doubt, the last few years of the Prozac patent sees millions a day at virtually no marginal cost. How come their balance sheet doesn't show that they are "printing money."

Could it be that maybe they are losing some money elsewhere? For every Prozac and Viagra, there's precisely a whole bunch of other projects that never pan out at all, and never recoup the millions invested there. A buncha millions here, a buncha millions there, and pretty soon you are talking real money.

Ultimately, Pharm is a risky business when viewed on a project by project basis. And younger companies without huge portfolios capable of generating a core product or two before the money runs out disappear every day -- just like the dot coms.

Now, back to my point. These companies are making good money, at least those that survived, and when viewing their most profitable projects without comparing the fiascos. Right. How about those that didn't?

More important, what if there was no chance for them to make those profits? No profits, no investments, no investments, no drugs. Instead of grandparents who couldn't afford the drugs, nobody at all could afford the drugs, for no one can buy what doesn't exist.

You are almost completely backwards on this

[arete]

Patent on X grants you the right to exclude anyone else from using X, including process XYZ, process Y that only works after preparing the surface with process X, or assembly A which uses part X as a widget.

It does NOT prevent someone else from patenting Y or XYZ. If you patent X and they patent Y, y'all better get along (or find a monetary way to get along) because neither of you can do process XYZ without the other.

Patents do NOT grant you the right to _do_ something, which is why you can get a patent on assembly A requiring widget X, even if you don't have the widget X patent and someone else does. Neither of you can use assembly A unless you cross-license.

Probably you're just a troll.