Table 2.
Case | Claimed Invention | Decision |
---|---|---|
American Wood-Paper Co. v. Fibre Disintegrating Co. (1874) | Refined cellulose caused by decomposition of the original substance | Not patentable, because the product is well-known to exist in nature and is in a “nearly pure” state |
Cochrane v. Badische Anilin & Soda Fabrik (1884) | Artificial version of natural red dye alizarine produced by manipulating original | Not patentable, because being produced in a novel way does not make it a new composition of matter |
American Fruit Growers v. Brogdex Co. (1931) | Fruit with skin treated with mold-resistant borax | Not patentable, because the mere addition of borax does not lead to the creation of a product that has a “new or distinctive form, quality, or property” |
Funk Brothers Seed Co. v. Kalo Inoculant Co. (1948) | Mixture of several naturally-occurring species of bacteria | Not patentable, because aggregation of species does not produce any new bacteria or enlargement of the activity of the individual strains, and is hence only a discovery of the handiwork of nature |
Diamond v. Chakrabarty (1980) | Microbe with specially-inserted DNA plasmid | Patentable, because the bacterium is not found in nature |
Association for Molecular Pathology v. Myriad Genetics (2013) | Isolated BRCA1 and BRCA2 DNA sequences cDNA |
Not patentable, because merely isolating a naturally occurring DNA sequence does not constitute an inventive step Patentable, because cDNA is not found in nature |