The United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has granted a 4th US patent (US8,697,853) to Cellectis' TAL-effector nucleases.

On April 15, 2014, the USPTO issued a fourth patent to the University of Minnesota and the Iowa State University for the TALEN technology developed by Cellectis.

This patent US 8,697,853 is more particularly drawn to the genomic sequences encoding TAL-effector nucleases. These proteins developed jointly by researchers at the University of Minnesota and Iowa State University can “read” DNA and make pinpoint cuts in targeted genes.

This fourth issued patent, like the previous ones, is part of a patent portfolio owned by the Regents of the University of Minnesota and Iowa State University Research Foundation and licensed exclusively to Cellectis as per a license agreement of January 2011.

The inventors of these patents are Pr. Daniel Voytas, from the University of Minnesota who is also acting as chief scientific officer of Cellectis Plant Sciences in New Brighton (MN), Pr Adam Bogdanove formerly of Iowa State University and currently of Cornell University, and Dr Feng Zhang, who is now chief operating officer of Cellectis Plant Sciences.

Cellectis is a biopharmaceutical company focused on oncology. The company’s mission is to develop a novel generation of therapy based on engineered T cells to treat cancer.