The Broad Institute, a biological and genomic research centre affiliated with MIT and Harvard, will keep valuable patents on a revolutionary gene-editing technology known as CRISPR, a U.S. patent agency ruled recently.a The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office’s Patent Trial and Appeal Board in Alexandria, Virginia, rejected a claim by a rival team, associated with the University of California at Berkeley and the University of Vienna in Austria, that it invented the technology first.a The patent rights could be worth billions of dollars because the technology could revolutionize treatment of genetic diseases and the genetic modification of crops.a Intellia Therapeutics Inc., which has a licensing deal with the University of California, said it would work on legal strategy with the University of California but that it was too early to comment on next steps.a The … (more)