One of the most hotly debated topics in intellectual property rights is the patentability of genes. Since the Supreme Court's 1980 decision in Diamond v. Chakrabarty,1 patenting DNA sequences has become common; today there are about 50,000 such patents. A 2009 lawsuit by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) against Myriad Genetics threatens to undo the significant history behind the patent eligibility of gene sequences.
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