Patenting/copyrighting genetic info, free availability of genetic codes

[Cory C. Albrecht]

Hello all,

With all the stuff going on right now about companies wanting to be able
to patent genetic sequences as they find them, and the hullabaloo about
"owning life" as it has been put by some, I was wondering what people
working in the scientific community would think of a web site that was
made to be a repository of genetic information that was freely available
to everybody?

Now I don't mean something like "this is the spot on chromosome <n>
where eye colour is found" or "the gene that determines juvenile
diabetes is found on chromosome <y>". I mean something like "The genetic
pattern for blue eyes, which is found at this spot on chromosome <n> is
CGGGTTACGTGTGTAAACC..., the pattern for brown eyes is
TTTGGGTTTGGGACACACGCGCGTGTG...". Though obviously it's a bit more
involved than that. :-)

Scientists (and maybe even enlightened corporations) working in the
genetic fields could submit the genetic sequences to the web site, which
would index and cross-reference them and then make them available to the
world at large. And in the event that patenting or copyrighting of
genetic info becomes legal, scientists and enlightened corporations
could confer authority over the patent/copyright to the organization
running the web site which would ensure that it was made freely
available.

What do people think? Especially what do scientists working to discover
genetic sequences think of this? Is this a good idea? A bad one? Is my
head so high in the clouds that I'm not realizing that no company would
ever be enlightened enough to make the genetic codes discovered by its
work available without charging something? Does this have real
possibilities or am I just some lunkhead who hasn't thought things
through?

Please let me know - both here in the newsgroup and via email! Thanks!

[Mitchell Isaacs]

"Cory C. Albrecht" <coryal...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:39A4BB8F...@hotmail.com...

> Hello all,
>
> With all the stuff going on right now about companies wanting to be able
> to patent genetic sequences as they find them, and the hullabaloo about
> "owning life" as it has been put by some, I was wondering what people
> working in the scientific community would think of a web site that was
> made to be a repository of genetic information that was freely available
> to everybody?

Try http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/
http://www.expasy.ch/

They also have good links.

Cheers,
Mitchell

[Jim Prall & Harriet Simand]

Mitchell Isaacs wrote in message
<2P8p5.10525$Xg.1...@news-server.bigpond.net.au>...

Also take a look at www.ensembl.org which is a major effort at just what
you describe.