Open GFP

[Sebastian S. Cocioba]

Is there a GFP plasmid that is in the public domain? Any word of an pOpenGFP type deal? If I recall correctly the EGFP patents are still valid so there are commercial restrictions. Regular wtGFP is fairly dim in comparison. Maybe a simple synthetic bio project could make this a reality?

Sebastian S Cocioba
CEO & Founder
New York Botanics, LLC

Sent via Mobile E-Mail

[Avery louie]

It is easy to get GFP, but there are no "open" versions, iirc.  A lot of the ones that are easy to get are some kind of egfp, and are possibly still patented.  A lot of the time it is just "GFP" and you dont know what it is.

--A

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[Cathal Garvey (Phone)]

My understanding is that pretty much every useful variant of GFP is patented, so for now wildtype GFP is the only option. Not that it's such a bad thing, it's still pretty fluorescent!

A project to make a new uber GFP would be great, but would be expensive I think: depends what synth co.s charge for mutant libraries. Possibly very little, as technically it makes their job eadier, not harder! ;)

Problem is, you would have to trawl existing patents to A) determine which mutants are not available for use and B) Check that nothing stupidly broad like "any mutations at this locus" was granted.

I'd chip in for such a project though! :)

"Sebastian S. Cocioba" <scoc...@gmail.com> wrote:

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[Sebastian S. Cocioba]

I do commercial work and GFP is my marker of choice. If I include a transformed plant with the marker and the plasmid used was patented, I would be violating copyright law. A legally unbound gfp plasmid would be ideal.

Sebastian S Cocioba

CEO & Founder

New York Botanics, LLC

Sent via Mobile E-Mail 

[Dakota Hamill]

What conotates a new plasmid?  Couldn't you just copy an existing GFP plasmid, modify or add a string of 10 random nucleotides of your choosing, and call it unique and your own?

[Mega]

Often they say (what I read so far) a polypeptide containing these 238 Amino acids or parts thereof that make it fluorescent.

If you insert some new AA randomly within the structure, this may work legally (but perhaps it won't fluoresce any more)

[Jeswin]

So what if you were to find a mutation (addition or deletion) that
would not have any or little affect on the fluorescence? Then the
sequence will be different. They can only patent those specific 238 or
whatever amino acids, right?

[Koeng]

Good point :/ I have a pGreen plasmid from Carolina that I am hoping to PCR out (Gibson assembly). I wonder what the result would be if I added a few random nucleotides to the reading frame.... I think I could try it out. For those people that are competent in protein design, any recommendations for codons that would not affect the protein much?

[Patrik D'haeseleer]

On Tuesday, January 22, 2013 11:01:52 AM UTC-8, Cathal Garvey (Phone) wrote:

A project to make a new uber GFP would be great, but would be expensive I think: depends what synth co.s charge for mutant libraries. Possibly very little, as technically it makes their job eadier, not harder! ;)

Problem is, you would have to trawl existing patents to A) determine which mutants are not available for use and B) Check that nothing stupidly broad like "any mutations at this locus" was granted.

How about just doing error-prone PCR, and select for brighter and/or different color colonies?

Either that, or someone should get MAGE to work in a DIY lab, stat! :-)

Patrik

[Patrik D'haeseleer]

On Tuesday, January 22, 2013 3:32:14 PM UTC-8, phillyj wrote:

So what if you were to find a mutation (addition or deletion) that
would not have any or little affect on the fluorescence? Then the
sequence will be different. They can only patent those specific 238 or
whatever amino acids, right?

No, they can patent whatever the patent office lets them get away with. And so far, the attitude at the patent office has been to allow claims that include even marginal levels of homology, with the idea that court challenges to the patent will sort these things out later.

Which is of course a really shitty system...

[Josh Perfetto]

The main GFP as a marker patent expires in the US in like 3 weeks, and in most of the rest of the world later this year, so basic GFP will soon be effectively open.

-Josh

[Avery louie]

What GFP is that?  Do we have a sequence?  Can we have a GFP liberation day?

--A

[Josh Perfetto]

The patent I was referring to is http://www.google.com/patents/US5491084

-Josh

[Sebastian S. Cocioba]

GFP party!!! Blacklights. Glow sticks. GFP-E Coli. Face paints. The works!

Sebastian S Cocioba

CEO & Founder

New York Botanics, LLC

Sent via Mobile E-Mail 

[Mega [Andreas Stuermer]]

EGFP is under this patent: 

http://www.shigen.nig.ac.jp/medaka/download/strain/pEGFP-1.pdf

(end of page 3) but it doesn't allow to copy the text. 

You have to emial them to use it commercially.