Time-lapse microscopy patent upheld in Europe: response to Pearce

In this piece, we comment on the article by Pearce earlier in this journal. As Pearce correctly points out, what is fundamentally at issue in ESHRE et al's opposition to Stanford University's European patent on time-lapse microscopy is whether an exclusion from patentability, here of methods of medical diagnosis, should be interpreted narrowly or not. In the present case, the dominant piece of case law from the European Patent Office (EPO) gives a narrow interpretation of what a method of diagnosis must be in order not to be patentable. In their submissions to the EPO, ESHRE et al. have argued that this narrow interpretation is unfounded and incorrect.