Nature’s Inventions: An Examination of Proposed Legislative Solutions to Patentable Subject Matter

The subject matter eligibility doctrine initially existed as a means of limiting the scope of an inventor’s patent claim. Over the past decade, the Supreme Court has broadened the scope of the doctrine to invalidate patents that effectively recite a claim for processes or products that exist in nature. These recent decisions have led to confusion over what inventions qualify as patent eligible under 35 U.S.C. § 101. The Federal Circuit and commentators have implored the legislature to weigh in on the issue and establish clearer guidance for what constitutes patentable subject matter. Two proposed bills introduced in the House and Senate seek to clarify the doctrine by allowing for patents to be granted more broadly to inventions that incorporate biological materials and other routine scientific practices. This Note argues that neither proposed law adequately addresses the underlying policy concerns left unaddressed by the Supreme Court in their recent decisions regarding the patentability of biological materials and processes. Rather than adopt either proposed law, Congress should draft an exclusionary rule for patent eligibility that precludes inventors from claiming a genetic sequence that exists in nature within their patent claim. Such a rule would impose a necessary limit to the scope of patent claims that reinforces the original goals of the subject matter eligibility doctrine.