Supreme Court Mulls Personalized Med

The high court considers the legitimacy of a patent on the relationship between blood tests and patient health.

| 2 min read

Register for free to listen to this article
Listen with Speechify
0:00
2:00
Share

WIKIMEDIA COMMONS, NODAR KHERKHEULIDZE

The US Supreme Court heard arguments this week in a patent trial that could change the nature of personalized medicine. The case involves pharmaceutical and diagnostic company Prometheus Laboratories, which filed patents on instructions for monitoring the levels of certain metabolites in the red blood cells of patients with Crohn's disease and other gastrointestinal autoimmune disorders to optimize drug dosing. The case made it to the country’s highest court after Prometheus sued Mayo Collaborative Services in 2004 for trying to market its own version of the test.

At the heart of the matter is whether the correlation between blood test results and patient health is patentable. According to patent law, "observation of a natural phenomenon" is not patentable, while "application of an observation of a ...

Interested in reading more?

Become a Member of

The Scientist Logo
Receive full access to more than 35 years of archives, as well as TS Digest, digital editions of The Scientist, feature stories, and much more!
Already a member? Login Here

Keywords

Meet the Author

  • Bob Grant

    From 2017 to 2022, Bob Grant was Editor in Chief of The Scientist, where he started in 2007 as a Staff Writer.
Share
3D illustration of a gold lipid nanoparticle with pink nucleic acid inside of it. Purple and teal spikes stick out from the lipid bilayer representing polyethylene glycol.
February 2025, Issue 1

A Nanoparticle Delivery System for Gene Therapy

A reimagined lipid vehicle for nucleic acids could overcome the limitations of current vectors.

View this Issue
Enhancing Therapeutic Antibody Discovery with Cross-Platform Workflows

Enhancing Therapeutic Antibody Discovery with Cross-Platform Workflows

sartorius logo
Considerations for Cell-Based Assays in Immuno-Oncology Research

Considerations for Cell-Based Assays in Immuno-Oncology Research

Lonza
An illustration of animal and tree silhouettes.

From Water Bears to Grizzly Bears: Unusual Animal Models

Taconic Biosciences
Sex Differences in Neurological Research

Sex Differences in Neurological Research

bit.bio logo

Products

Photo of a researcher overseeing large scale production processes in a laboratory.

Scaling Lentiviral Vector Manufacturing for Optimal Productivity

Thermo Fisher Logo
Collage-style urban graphic of wastewater surveillance and treatment

Putting Pathogens to the Test with Wastewater Surveillance

An illustration of an mRNA molecule in front of a multicolored background.

Generating High-Quality mRNA for In Vivo Delivery with lipid nanoparticles

Thermo Fisher Logo
Tecan Logo

Tecan introduces Veya: bringing digital, scalable automation to labs worldwide