Intellectual Property Law Commons^™

Universities: The Fallen Angels Of Bayh-Dole?, Rebecca S. Eisenberg, Robert Cook-Deegan

Articles

The Bayh-Dole Act of 1980 established a new default rule that allowed nonprofit organizations and small businesses to own, as a routine matter, patents on inventions resulting from research sponsored by the federal government. Although universities helped get the Bayh-Dole Act through Congress, the primary goal, as reflected in the recitals at the beginning of the new statute, was not to benefit universities but to promote the commercial development and utilization of federally funded inventions. In the years since the passage of the Bayh-Dole Act, universities seem to have lost sight of this distinction. Their behavior as patent seekers, patent …

The Teach Act: Recognizing Its Challenges And Overcoming Its Limitations, Oren R. Griffin, Stephana I. Colbert

Articles, Chapters in Books and Other Contributions to Scholarly Works

Technological advancements centered on the Internet, distance education, and digitally transmitted information have created tremendous opportunities for educational institutions. Congress enacted the Technology, Education, and Copyright Harmonization Act (TEACH Act) to exploit these opportunities and provide educators with an important tool to take advantage of the information super-highway. While the Congressional intent of the Act has merit, its provisions arguably create troubling obligations and potential liability for colleges and universities. This article discusses challenges presented by the TEACH Act and proposes modifications intended to address some of the most troubling aspects of the Act.

Bayh-Dole Reform And The Progress Of Biomedicine, Arti K. Rai, Rebecca S. Eisenberg

Articles

Allowing universities to patent the results of government-sponsored research sometimes works against the public interest.

Bayh-Dole Reform And The Progress Of Biomedicine, Arti K. Rai, Rebecca S. Eisenberg

Articles

Advances in fundamental biomedical research play an important and growing role in the development of new therapeutic and diagnostic products. Although the development of pharmaceutical end products has long been a proprietary enterprise, biomedical research comes from a very different tradition of open science. Within this tradition, long-standing norms call for relatively unfettered access to fundamental knowledge developed by prior researchers. The tradition of open science has eroded considerably over the past quarter century as proprietary claims have reached farther upstream from end products to cover fundamental discoveries that provide the knowledge base for future product development.

Patents, Product Exclusivity, And Information Dissemination: How Law Directs Biopharmaceutical Research And Development, Rebecca S. Eisenberg

Other Publications

It's a great honor for me to be invited to deliver the Levine Distinguished Lecture at Fordham, and a great opportunity to try out some new ideas before this audience. As some of you know, I've been studying the role of patents in biomedical research and product development ("R&D") for close to twenty years now, with a particular focus on how patents work in "upstream" research in universities and biotechnology companies that are working on research problems that arise prior to "downstream" product development. But, of course, the patent strategies of these institutions are designed around the profits that everyone …

The Impact Of "Fair Use" In The Higher Education Community: A Necessary Exception?, Oren R. Griffin, Stephana I. Colbert

Articles, Chapters in Books and Other Contributions to Scholarly Works

Despite legislative efforts to define it, the concept of Fair Use has been the subject of aggressive debate among publishers, authors, librarians, and users of copyrighted information ("academics") at academic institutions. With the advent of the Internet and the prospect of multimedia projects, the debate has intensified and expanded into the international community.

This Article focuses primarily on the challenges that face academic administrators and college and university attorneys seeking to advise their academic clients of the parameters of the Fair Use Doctrine-encouraging both sharing and dissemination of scholarly information, and compliance with the law, while limiting institutional liability. This …