Opinion Of The Court in MOLECULAR PATHOLOGY V. MYRIAD GENETICS
The Human Genetic Code Cannot Be Patented
Genes form the basis for hereditary traits in living organisms. The human genome consists of approximately 22,000 genes packed into 23 pairs of chromosomes. Each gene is encoded as DNA, which takes the shape of the familiar “double helix” that Doctors James Watson and Francis Crick first described in 1953. Each “cross-bar” in the DNA helix consists of two chemically joined nucleotides. Changes in the genetic sequence are called mutations. Mutations can be as small as the alteration of a single nucleotide — a change affecting only one letter in the genetic code. Such small-scale changes can produce an entirely…
