Toolgen registers ‘reporter gene’ patent for US genome editing

Toolgen said Wednesday that it has registered a patent on “reporter genes” used to observe the function of genome editing, in the United States.

A reporter gene, often called merely a reporter, is a gene that researchers attach to a regulatory sequence of another gene of interest in bacteria, cell culture, animals or plants.

This patent is a method that enables the observation of the function of genome editing transferred to cells in the form of color or cell mark through protein expression. The technique can be used to enrich cells that have undergone genetic correction by genome editing. Toolgen registered patents for this technology in 2014 in Korea, and last year in Japan.

CRISPR genome editing is widely used in life sciences because they can selectively correct specific genetic information in cells as a vital tool in genome editing technology. Toolgen is a bio-venture company that holds the original patents of CRISPR gene scissors and is engaged in business in the fields of disease treatments and plant breeding.

The company has filed and reviewed the patent for the CRISPR genome editing in 10 countries, including the U.S., Europe, and Japan, and confirmed its competitiveness through Korean registration last year and by winning approval in Australia.

Toolgen has recently licensed its patent for CRISPR genome editing to Monsanto, the world's largest seed company, and Thermo Fisher Scientific, a global company in the field of products and services for life sciences research, according to its news release.