AI drug patents face a human inventor test

Insilico Medicine promoted a pulmonary fibrosis drug candidate as discovered by its generative AI platform, but the patent for the new chemical structure lists human inventors, including CEO Alex Zhavoronkov. The contrast reflects a central constraint in US intellectual-property law: patents require a human inventor, even when AI plays a fundamental role in designing a molecule.

US courts reinforced that position in 2022 after Ryan Abbott brought a test case naming an AI system called DABUS as the inventor of a better food container. The appeals court said patent statutes use the term individual, meaning a human being, and rejected broader philosophical questions about machine creativity or legal rights.

The unresolved issue is how much human contribution is enough when AI generates potential inventions. Abbott warns that AI-generated drug patents could face challenges if the named inventors are deemed incorrect, while current patent office policy treats AI as a tool that applicants do not need to disclose. Drug companies are keeping people involved in synthesis, variants, animal testing, budgeting, and other steps that can support human inventorship claims.