Patents for seeds and plants.Plants, seeds and plant tissue cultures are now eligible for patent protection, according to according to prep. 1. As stated or indicated by; on the authority of: according to historians. 2. In keeping with: according to instructions. 3. the U.S. Board of Patent Appeals and Interferences The Board of Patent Appeals and Interferences (BPAI) is a body of the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), which decides issues of patentability. If an applicant for an invention cannot convince a patent examiner that they are entitled to their claims, then the . Formerly, patent protection was limited to plant varieties reproducing asexually a·sex·u·al adj. 1. Having no evident sex or sex organs; sexless. 2. Relating to, produced by, or involving reproduction that occurs without the union of male and female gametes, as in binary fission or budding. 3. and to single, novel varieties of sexually reproducing plants. It did not allow patents on seeds and tissue cultures or patents covering a given modification in any variety. The policy reversal came in response to a case brought by Kenneth A. Hibberd of Molecular Genetics molecular genetics n. The branch of genetics that deals with hereditary transmission and variation on the molecular level. , Inc., in Minnetonka, Minn. The company had applied for a patent on new corn seeds and plants having high levels of tryptophan tryptophan (trĭp`təfăn), organic compound, one of the 20 amino acids commonly found in animal proteins. Only the l-stereoisomer appears in mammalian protein. , an amino acid amino acid (əmē`nō), any one of a class of simple organic compounds containing carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, and in certain cases sulfur. These compounds are the building blocks of proteins. that is deficient in all natural varieties of corn. The company plans to produce corn with improved nutritional value for livestock feed. "Novel, man-made plants, seeds and plant tissue cultures will now be accorded the same protection as live, man-made microorganisms, which were the subject of another landmark decision [by the 1980 Supreme Court]," says Franklin Pass of Molecular Genetics. The plant patent decision is considered crucial to the application of biotechnology to agriculture. S. Leslie Misrock, the lawyer who represented Molecular Genetics, says, "Without such patent protection, the risks of undertaking plant research would be too great and the rewards too small to provide adequate incentive to pursue such research. This [decision] will transform the seed industry from a commodity into a specially products business." |
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