Department: School of Law and Criminology
Vacancy ID: 030401
Closing Date: 26-Sep-2024

Overview of the PatentsInHumans project:

PatentsInHumans is a 5-year European Research Council Starting Grant funded project led by Principal Investigator, Professor Aisling McMahon, which commenced on 1st November 2022. 

PatentsInHumans (www.patentsinhumans.eu) investigates the role of bioethics in the patenting and licensing of technologies related to the human body, including, for example, medicines, medical devices, isolated elements of the human body in Europe etc. The Project explores two related central research questions, namely: What are the potential bioethical implications that the grant and/or licensing of patents over technologies related to the human body have for how we treat, use, or modify our bodies? And how can such bioethical considerations be further incorporated within patent decision-making in Europe to facilitate a system where the patenting and licensing of such technologies addresses potential bioethical issues at stake? To investigate these questions, the project develops a novel cross disciplinary institutional analysis combining doctrinal and empirical methods to evaluate the key legal, structural and cultural barriers leading to the current marginalisation of bioethics in European patent decision-making for technologies related to the human body. It aims to radically reconceptualise the current system to formulate pathways to assimilate bioethics within patent decision-making systems for such technologies, with important and timely policy and conceptual implications.

The Role

As part of this project, we are seeking to appoint a Postdoctoral Researcher. Under the supervision of Prof Aisling McMahon, the successful candidate will conduct empirical and desk-based research and analysis to gain insights over the types of bioethical issues that can be posed by patents over such technologies, and to develop an understanding of to what extent such bioethical issues are currently considered, if at all within the relevant legal systems in Europe, and potential challenges to engaging with such considerations.

As part of this work, under the supervision of the Principal Investigator, the successful candidate will conduct semi-structured interviews and focus groups with relevant experts and stakeholders to gain qualitative understandings of the potential bioethical implications posed by patents over such technologies and challenges to engaging with these under the current patent decision-making system in Europe. Together with the Principal Investigator they will analyse such data and will contribute to project deliverables and publications. The successful candidate will also support the Principal Investigator in carrying out other research tasks related to the project, including conducting legal research, literature reviews and contributing to project reports.

The Postdoctoral Researcher will join a dynamic, well-supported multidisciplinary team within the research-intensive School of Law and Criminology in Maynooth University. They will be supported in their personal career development plan throughout the project by Professor McMahon.

For this position, we are ideally looking to appoint a candidate with knowledge of empirical methods and analysis, such as semi-structured interviews or focus groups. Ideally, it is also desirable that the successful candidate has relevant knowledge of the areas related to the project, such as, for example, intellectual property law, health law, and/or bioethics.

This project has received funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Horizon Europe research and innovation programme under grant agreement No. 101042147.

Salary:

Post-Doctoral Researcher Level 1 (2024): €44,347– €44,941 p.a. (2 points - with increment)

Appointments will be made in accordance with public sector pay provisions.