(By George Wu) Last year, I wrote an article entitled “Can Genes Be Patented?” referring – at that time – to the impending U.S. Supreme Court decision.  The following article is a summary of the prior history and the decision by the U.S. Supreme Court concerning the patenting of DNA.

From the 1980s, scientists from around the world started to search for specific genes that were associated with increased hereditary risk for breast cancer.  By 1990, two genes, BRCA1 and BRCA2, were discovered that if they had specific mutations/alleles would impart an increased risk for breast cancer in women.