Biotech Century

Human Animal Chimera Patent Challenge

In 1997, Dr. Stuart Newman, the inventor of the patent claim and Jeremy Rifkin, the co-owner of the invention, submitted a patent application to the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (PTO) seeking a patent for certain human/animal hybrid life forms (chimeras) including a "humouse" and a "humanzee". The patent raised fundamental questions regarding how much human material is patentable under existing U.S. statutes. The patent was ultimately rejected by the US PTO in 2005. The aim of the patent was not to actually create the chimeras, but, rather, to force the US PTO to deny patents on all human-animal chimeric inventions in the future. If the PTO were to have granted the patent, Dr. Newman and Mr. Rifkin pledged to hold the twenty-year patent on such research in order to keep others from attempting to create and patent such creations.