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From: amlovell@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Anthony M Lovell)
Newsgroups: talk.bizarre,misc.legal,talk.politics.misc,misc.jobs.misc,sci.bio
Subject: Re: Are Animals Patentable?
Message-ID: <2662@phoenix.Princeton.EDU>
Date: 26 Apr 88 00:09:40 GMT
References: <97500013@prism> <4872@xanth.cs.odu.edu> <9915@tekecs.TEK.COM> <1146@maccs.UUCP>
Organization: Princeton University, NJ
Lines: 20
Summary: new mice not so hot, really

In article <1146@maccs.UUCP>, cs4l3az@maccs.UUCP (....Jose) writes:
> In article <9915@tekecs.TEK.COM> andrew@frip.gwd.tek.com (Andrew Klossner) writes:
> >>> Harvard Univ. was just granted a PATENT for a new species of mice!
> >>> (genetically engineered.)
> 	What exactly is so special about these mice?

The new mice are not really good as far as general purpose rodents go...
If you're looking for a mouse who will nip at the cheese and give the
cat an occasional run for its money, stick to the good ol' public domain
variety and save yourself the royalties.  The patented critters are
especially made for cancer studies and offer this exciting advantage
over regular mice -> about half of them will develop cancer due to their
genetic composition.  This saves the labs the cost of making them drink
vast oceans of Tab or sending them on a week's cruise aboard a Soviet
submarine.  In all - the mice are just not really healthy.

-- 
amlovell@phoenix.princeton.edu     ...since 1963.

disclaimer:
These are MY opinions.  You only WISH they were yours.