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Genius grant winner studies impact of patent policies on medical research

Among the 24 winners of the MacArthur Foundation’s genius grants this year is an economist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who studied how intellectual property rights stifle medical innovation.

The grant winner, Heidi Williams, is best known for a study that found granting nonpatent intellectual rights to a private company, Celera, on genes that it had sequenced reduced scientific research in sequencing of the human genome by 20 to 30 percent, report Corporate Counsel, MIT News and a description by the MacArthur Foundation. Her work was cited in a 2013 U.S. Supreme Court case that held isolated human genes cannot be patented.

In a follow-up study, Williams and a co-author found evidence that patent protection on human genes didn’t substantively hinder later research, “suggesting that the precise design of intellectual property policies is important in shaping innovation outcomes,” according to the MacArthur Foundation release.

Williams also participated in a study that found patent protection for drugs, which begins at the time of filing rather than when a drug is brought to market, provides a longer period of protection for late-stage cancer drugs, which take a shorter time to test and bring to market than early-stage cancer drugs. As a result, the system creates a bias against the development of early-stage cancer drugs.