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Team:Groningen/human practices legal perspective
From 2011.igem.org
Introduction
Over the last few year there has been much addoo about intelectual properties
This section of our wiki tries to give biolegist a understandable legal perspective on the current state of patent law in europe. It does this by ex For
Patent law in general
Patents The main justification for a patent system is to protect the investments required to develop a new method
Some historian argue that patent law originated as early as the itallian renaisance but
According to data from the World Intellectual Property Organization over 1.5 million patents where granted world wide last year alone. This number of course contains many
- New (unpubli)
Patent versus Copyrigth
What rigths do patents give?
- You can still us patented cells for research purposes
Eurpepean patent law
European Patent law is governed by a several international agreements in addtion to a great many national laws. The most important of these are:
- The European Patent Convention (In force since October 7th 1977, newest revistion)
- Strasbourg Patent Convention (In force since August 1s, 1980)
- The TRIPS agreement (In effect since January 1st 1995)
Addtionally biological patents specifcally are heavely influenced by:
- Directive 98/44/EC (In force since Juli 30th 1998)
- Convention on Biological Diversity (In effect since 29th December 1993)
A quick description of each of these treaties:
The European Patent Convention It States that:
7 October 1977 muchen convention
European patents shall not be granted in respect of: (a) inventions the commercial exploitation of which would be contrary to "ordre public" or morality; such exploitation shall not be deemed to be so contrary merely because it is prohibited by law or regulation in some or all of the Contracting States; (b) plant or animal varieties or essentially biological processes for the production of plants or animals; this provision shall not apply to microbiological processes or the products thereof; (c) methods for treatment of the human or animal body by surgery or therapy and diagnostic methods practised on the human or animal body; this provision shall not apply to products, in particular substances or compositions, for use in any of these methods.
