[Source Genome Web, Ben Butkis] -The proliferation of patenting by US universities has resulted in a greater number of university administrators requiring material transfer agreements for research tool exchanges, which in turn has hindered scientific research, according to results of a recent survey of agricultural biologists.
In addition, the researchers behind the survey suggest that agreements between universities designed to limit patenting of widely used academic research tools or encourage IP sharing could remedy the situation.
The results of the survey, launched in 2005 by researchers from the University of California, Berkeley, and the University of Arizona, appear in the January issue of Nature Biotechnology.
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