On Friday, September 28, 2012, Genetic Technologies (plaintiff) filed a complaint against Medical Diagnostic Laboratories (MDL) (defendant) for patent infringement in the U.S. Court of New Jersey (case no. 3:12-cv-06053).

Genetic Technologies is involved in genetic testing  and allied research aiming at uncovering the impact of DNA on health. Medical Diagnostic Laboratories serves primarily as a reference laboratory for Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) based testing to physicians, laboratories and hospitals worldwide.

The patent US5612179 involved is in suit is assigned to Genetic Technologies (source: MaxVal’s Assignment Database[i]). The patent titled Intron sequence analysis method for detection of adjacent and remote locus alleles as haplotypes was issued on March 18, 1997 and expires on March 18, 2014[ii], and relates to methods of analyzing of non-coding DNA sequences.

According to the complaint, MDL offers genetic carrier screening for Cystic Fibrosis (CF) using PCR amplification and allele-specific oligonucleotide hybridization. CF screening tests the CF Transmembrane conductance Regulator (CFTR) for the presence of 32 specific mutations. MDL’s analysis of the Poly T variation of CFTR gene allegedly infringes the above patent. Also MDL has analyzed non-coding polymorphisms linked to coding region alleles with a primer pair spanning a non-coding DNA region in the provision of its genetic carrier screening service, again infringing the above patent.

Genetics Technology has filed similar suits involving the same patent against the companies as listed below:

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