The Supreme Court ruled Thursday that our natural DNA can't be patented, in what the influential SCOTUSBlog called "a significant patent ruling for the biotechnology industry." The high court did stike some middle ground by ruling that synthetic DNA can be patented. "A naturally occurring DNA segment is a product of nature and not patent eligible merely because it has been isolated, but cDNA [synthetic DNA] is patent eligible because it is not naturally occurring," according to the court ruling written by Justice Clarence Thomas.