
“Heroes of CRISPR” Disputed - Gatsky
http://www.the-scientist.com//?articles.view/articleNo/45119/title/-Heroes-of-CRISPR--Disputed/
======
jforman
I worked at the Broad in a past life. I find it shocking that Cell let Lander
publish his article without a conflict of interest statement, considering a) a
key patent just went into interference proceedings and b) most people assume a
Nobel will be issued in the not-too-distant future and the Broad would benefit
greatly from having sponsored Nobel-winning science.

Take, for example, Church's newly released comment that he was NOT "aware of
Zhang’s efforts" like Lander claims he was in the article when his lab tried
to move CRISPR into a mammalian system. Zhang et al. are trying to paint the
move to a mammalian system as a key moment of invention, making it patent-
worthy. If another scientist's first instinct is to do the exact same thing,
it suggests that such a move is "obvious to a person skilled in the art" and
casts doubt on the novelty of Zhang's work.

~~~
daughart
Working in the Church lab (although not on CRISPR) at the time both papers
came out, I recall everyone being surprised at Zhang's efforts even at the
time of publication!

~~~
skosuri
I sat next to you and I wasn't surprised.

~~~
daughart
Maybe I just didn't pick up on the buzz. (Just so people have context its a
large lab divided between several physical rooms across two buildings. I was a
relatively new grad student at the time.)

------
carbocation
The most remarkable feature of this discord is that the media discussion
started based on a comment on PubMed by Dr. Doudna [1]. Just 5 minutes ago as
of the time of this comment, another key player (Dr. Charpentier) has written
a follow-up comment on PubMed [2].

This is the type of realtime feedback that would not have happened in a public
forum just a few years ago.

(Disclosure: I have worked at the Broad and likely will again in the future.)

1 =
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/m/pubmed/26771483/#cm26771483_1...](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/m/pubmed/26771483/#cm26771483_13783)

2 =
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/m/pubmed/26771483/#cm26771483_1...](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/m/pubmed/26771483/#cm26771483_13792)

~~~
FaceKicker
Both your URLs go to the same page (was going to say they were the same URL,
but they're not). Maybe [1] was supposed to be the below?

[1]
[http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25430774](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25430774)

~~~
carbocation
You are correct; they both go to the same page. One is a direct link to
Doudna's comment, the other to Charpentier's comment on the same page... but
since the page is so short, there is nothing to scroll to, so they look like
they are the same link.

------
epistasis
From a slightly different angle, Lior Pachter focuses on how science is often
a pyramid scheme of sorts:

[https://liorpachter.wordpress.com/2016/01/18/the-heroes-
of-c...](https://liorpachter.wordpress.com/2016/01/18/the-heroes-of-crispr/)

>There is a more cynical view of the PI model, namely that by running large
labs PIs are able to benefit from a scientific roulette of their own making.
PIs can claim credit for successes while blaming underlings for failures. Even
one success can fund numerous failures, and so the wheel spins faster and
faster…the PI always wins.

>Lander concludes his perspective by writing that “the [CRISPR] narrative…is a
wonderful lesson for a young person contemplating a life in science”. That may
be true of the CRISPR narrative, but the lesson of his narrative is that young
persons should not count on leaders in their field to recognize their work.

~~~
nextos
I was about to say the same thing, but Lior's writeup is much more
straightforward.

I started doing research in formal methods but later moved to computational
biology. Half a decade later I'm still surprised by the concepts of PI, last
author and lack of blind reviews.

How can anyone that does not even understand the main ideas in my works sign
it as a major author?

------
rgejman
I wonder if the patent war over CRISPR will ever be relevant, given the
discovery of Cpf1 and other Cas9-like molecules
[http://www.cell.com/abstract/S0092-8674(15)01200-3](http://www.cell.com/abstract/S0092-8674\(15\)01200-3)

Does anyone know if the existing CRISPR patents are specific to Cas9 or do
they cover any RNA-guided endonucleases?

~~~
siyer
See: [http://www.ipscell.com/2016/01/patent-expert-weighs-in-on-
cr...](http://www.ipscell.com/2016/01/patent-expert-weighs-in-on-crispr-
dispute-between-uc-broad/) and [https://law.stanford.edu/2015/12/29/the-
crispr-patent-interf...](https://law.stanford.edu/2015/12/29/the-crispr-
patent-interference-showdown-is-on-how-did-we-get-here-and-what-comes-next/)
They're mostly specific to Cas9.

------
tdaltonc
Part of the problem here is the legal environment created by Bayh–Dole,
Stanford v. Roche, and their fallout. These universities do not play a
substantive role in the development of these technologies, but they get the IP
because researcher are obliged to sign away their rights in order to get
federal funds. Inventions are the natural property of their inventors, and we
should make it harder to compel them to preemptively sigh away those rights.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bayh%E2%80%93Dole_Act](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bayh%E2%80%93Dole_Act)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanford_University_v._Roche_M...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanford_University_v._Roche_Molecular_Systems,_Inc).

~~~
gertef
Stanford v. Roche seems to say that Bayh-Dole does NOT allow inventors to sign
away their rights to the University or the Government.

~~~
tdaltonc
As I understand it, Stanford v Roche only said that the assignments that they
made the researchers sign were not sufficiently stringent. And not
universities just compel researchers to sigh a more explicit and complete
assignment.

------
gertef
It's disheartening that Cell would even publish a non-scientific opintionated
fluff article about "Heroes" under the same banner as its peer-reviewed
research articles.

Such an article is fine for a magazine, or an adjunct comment, but not a
scientific journal.

~~~
mturmon
It's a common format for a flagship wide-area journal (like _Cell_ or
_Science_ ) to have editorial content at the front of the journal and the more
hard-core research papers at the back. The editorial content can be breaking
news, political/social context (e.g., Federal budgets, legislation), review
articles, summaries and context for the technical articles at the back, and
position papers seeking community comment.

Getting a paper in the front pages of the journal is a matter of invitation,
and getting one in the back is considered ... how to say it ... the righteous
way?

------
avani
Summed up nicely by Alexis Verger on Twitter: "#CRISPRFacts: CRISPR is so
powerful it can edit its own history."

------
qq66
People will forget about the attribution disputes in 100 years but from my
reading, it looks like CRISPR may become the greatest achievement in biology
since the theory of evolution by natural selection.

~~~
dekhn
I don't really see that. It's mainly a more convenient method for genetic
alteration. We previously had tools that did this, it was just harder. And
bacteria did all the really hard work.

~~~
qq66
But the iteration speed that this enables is like going from punch cards to
continuous deployment.

------
PakG1
Carmack on patents:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=451283](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=451283)

~~~
dang
We detached this comment from
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10934783](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10934783)
and marked it off-topic.

~~~
PakG1
I thought that his being frustrated with the fact that independent research
and development could independently come up with the same idea as someone else
was very related to the topic? :(

~~~
dang
Only generically; generic tangents aren't great for ontopicness. But the real
problem is that it wasn't a reply to the very specific and informed comment we
detached it from.

~~~
PakG1
OK, I understand that. Well then, keep up the good work. HN remains in good
health and hands.

------
peter303
Only three can get the Nobel Prize. Let the wars begin!

