title: Living things, the human genome, and patents.
abstract: For many years, patents and living things have not gotten along well in people's minds; nevertheless, patents are a real right. Even though people accept that a farmer can own a cow or that a Parisian can own a dog, they do not seem to understand that it is possible to patent a recombinant micro-organism or a DNA sequence. This is probably because industrial property is a hybrid concept, which mixes rights and science. Thus, this field is prone to misunderstanding by scientists and jurists, because of its juridical aspects for the former and because of its scientific aspects for the latter. The general public,as a result has two avenues of extravagant questioning to follow and consider. Finally, if industrial property is applied to a living phenomenon, it is often almost impossible to explain in layman's terms the ins and outs of the problems that may arise.
authors.affiliation: Conseil en Propriété Industrielle, Cabinet Regimbeau, Paris, France. info@regimbeau.fr
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Warcoin
mesh_terms: D001709:Biotechnology; D004247:DNA; D005060:Europe; D005796:Genes; D015894:Genome, Human; D006801:Humans; D010330:Patents as Topic; D014481:United States
chemical_list: D004247:DNA