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Federal Court Orders Reassessment of CRISPR-Cas9 Patent Dispute

The Federal Circuit vacates the 2022 PTAB decision favoring the Broad Institute, instructing a reevaluation of evidence under the correct legal standard.

A researcher performs a CRISPR/Cas9 process in Germany in 2019.
Biochemist Jennifer Doudna, left, and French scientist Emmanuelle Charpentier are honored at the Nobel Prize ceremony in 2022.
Image
Illustration of CRISPR-Cas9 editing DNA.

Overview

  • The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has remanded the CRISPR-Cas9 patent case to the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) for reconsideration of its 2022 ruling.
  • The court found that the PTAB applied incorrect legal standards in determining that the Broad Institute was the first to invent CRISPR-Cas9 gene editing in eukaryotic cells.
  • CVC, led by Jennifer Doudna and Emmanuelle Charpentier, had argued that their 2012 discoveries laid the foundation for CRISPR-Cas9, with subsequent broad applicability to all cell types.
  • The decision reopens the contentious legal battle over patents that could influence the future of lucrative licensing agreements and global commercialization of CRISPR technology.
  • Both sides remain confident in their claims, with the PTAB now tasked with reassessing all relevant evidence to determine the rightful inventor of this groundbreaking gene-editing technology.