Maynooth University academic Dr Aisling McMahon has been awarded a prestigious European Research Council (ERC) Starting grant worth €1.5 million to undertake a five-year research project examining the bioethical implications posed by patents over technologies related to the human body.
Dr McMahon, an Associate Professor in the School of Law and Criminology, Maynooth University, will lead a team of four researchers on the project entitled ‘PatentsInHumans’ which will investigate the bioethical implications of patents over technologies which relate to the human body, such as: medicines, human genes, elements of diagnostic tests, prosthetic limbs, and human enhancement technologies for instance, potential future uses of brain implant technologies.
Patents allow rightsholders to control how patented technologies are accessed and by whom. Therefore, patents granted over technologies related to the human body and how they are licensed can have significant implications for how we treat, use and modify our human bodies. ‘PatentsInHumans’ focuses on understanding these bioethical implications and reconceptualising how they are incorporated within European patent decision-making.
This is the second ERC grant to be awarded to members of the School of Law and Criminology over the past two years and follows a €2million ERC Consolidator grant awarded to Professor Delia Ferri in 2019 for her project ‘DANCING’.
Upon receiving this award, Dr McMahon said: “I am delighted and honoured to be awarded this European Research Council grant, it will allow me to develop a comprehensive and much-needed analysis of the bioethical implications posed by patents over technologies related to the human body.
“Under the current European patent system, the human body itself is not patentable. However, many technologies that relate to the human body, such as medicines, isolated human genes, and medical devices are patentable. Given the blurring between the human body and patentable technologies, such patents can pose significant bioethical implications affecting how we treat, use, and modify our bodies. We see this in many contexts including COVID-19. Yet such bioethical implications are often marginalised within patent decision-making.
“This project aims to understand and bridge the disconnect between bioethics and patent law and ultimately, to reimagine European patent decision-making to incorporate bioethical considerations within it.”
Dr McMahon also paid tribute to the research environment in Maynooth University: “I would like to acknowledge the strong research culture and environment provided by the School of Law and Criminology, led by Head of School Professor Michael Doherty, and Maynooth University more generally in encouraging and supporting this application. I am also very grateful for the incredible support and advice provided by our fantastic Research Development Office throughout the application process.”
Professor Eeva Leinonen, President of Maynooth University commended Dr McMahon saying: “On behalf of Maynooth University, I would like to congratulate Dr McMahon on achieving this grant. Maynooth is internationally renowned for its humanities and social science work, and this project is indicative of the ethos and expertise at the University. Over the past twelve months, the university has been awarded grants across multiple disciplines, and this achievement continues our success.”
ERC Starting Grants are designed to support excellent academics and researchers to help them establish their own independent research team or programme. The highly prestigious ERC award is viewed as the gold standard for research funding in Europe. Dr McMahon is one of an elite group of recipients who have been highlighted for their outstanding research. ‘PatentsInHumans’ is a ground-breaking project it will formulate new pathways to bring bioethics into European patent decision-making with timely and important conceptual and policy implications.
Prof. Delia Ferri is researching on the implementation of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) within the European Union (EU) and its Member States. Currently, Prof. Ferri is Principal Investigator of the project
Protecting the Right to Culture of Persons with Disabilities and Enhancing Cultural Diversity through European Union Law: Exploring New Paths (DANCING). DANCING explores the right of persons with disabilities to take part in cultural life as an essential aspect of enhancing cultural diversity in the EU, and aims to produce ground-breaking knowledge. By using a combination of legal, empirical and arts-based research, and adopting a participatory approach, DANCING pursues three complementary objectives, experiential, normative and theoretical respectively. The project is funded by the European Research Council (Grant agreement No. 864182). Prof. Ferri is also co-investigator in the H2020 project
Rethinking Digital Copyright Law for a Culturally Diverse, Accessible, Creative Europe (ReCreating Europe), where she investigates access to digital cultural goods for people with disabilities, from an intersectional perspective. As member of the H2020 project
SHAPES, she focuses on regulatory frameworks to support independence and enhanced quality of life for older people with disabilities. On the whole, Prof. Ferri’s research falls within the broader realm of EU Law and Comparative Law.
Professor Doherty and Dr Mangan are currently working on a European Commission Project investigating the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on employment relations in the aviation industry. VIRAL is a two-year project, with 12 partners from six EU Member States. The project aims to identify measures to reduce the impact of Covid-19 on the air transport sector. A vital consideration for the VIRAL project involves mapping employment relations changes in the European air transport value chain, due to the impact of lockdowns, and mapping plans to re-invigorate the industry in the coming years.
Professor Doherty, Head of the School of Law and Criminology, is currently undertaking research on different ways of regulating new forms of employment emerging through technological advance, and through the increasingly differentiated forms of employment relationship that are observable. The digitalisation of the workplace leads to both completely new phenomena, and also traditional legal challenges present in novel forms. The research looks at changing conceptions of the employment relationship, relating to workers in the ‘gig economy’, but also workers ‘on the borderline’ of employee/self-employed status; the ‘false-self-employed’, and seeks to examine legislative, and other regulatory, strategies ensure the rights of such workers are secured.
Dr Amina Adanan is researching on the topic of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights as customary international law. She is editing and contributing to the book, The Universal Declaration of Human Rights at Seventy; A Review of Successes and Challenges, which will be published by Clarus Press in 2019. This book is also edited by Prof Michael Doherty, Dr Noelle Higgins and Dr David Doyle. In addition, Amina researches on the topic of universal criminal jurisdiction, and its historical development under international law. She is currently researching on the effectiveness of European prosecutions of international crimes committed in Syria, under universal jurisdiction.
Dr David Doyle is currently in the process of completing a co-authored book on capital punishment in post-independence Ireland. He was also recently awarded an Irish Research Council New Foundations Award to seed a new study on Human Trafficking in Ireland.
Dr Delia Ferri Dr Ferri’s research is currently focusing on how the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities has been implemented in the European Union and within selected EU Member States, and she is addressing how the rights of persons with disabilities are protected and promoted in Europe. Her research falls within the broader realm of European Union Law and Comparative Law.
Dr Brian Flanagan’s research centres on the prospects for an account of collective intention that coheres with our ordinary understanding of the notion.
Professor Claire Hamilton is currently writing up comparative research into counter-terrorism funded by the Irish Research Council New Horizons Research Project scheme (2015-2017). This will be published as a book, Contagion, Counter-terrorism and Criminology: Justice in the Shadow of Terror by Palgrave Press in 2019. Prof. Hamilton is also engaged on research into human rights and governmentality and is co-editing (with Prof. Randy K. Lippert, Windsor University, Canada) a special issue of Critical Criminology on this theme in March 2020.
Dr. Noelle Higgins is working on a project on the issue of cultural cleansing.
Dr Louise Kennefick is currently working on a project which examines the interrelationship between social deprivation and criminal law defences within an interdisciplinary context. She is also engaged in an extensive study seeking to capture an oral history of the Irish Probation Service from the perspective of its core stakeholders, spanning the 1960s to present-day, deriving from her membership of the European Co-operation in Science and Technology (COST) Action network on Offender Supervision.
Dr Neil Maddox is studying the interaction between informal norms, such as cooperation and altruism, and how they interact with positive law in collective action settings.
Dr. Ian Marder’s research currently focuses on two main areas. The first involves engaging with researchers, policymakers and practitioners across Europe to stimulate the implementation of the recent Council of Europe Recommendation CM/Rec(2018)8 concerning restorative justice in criminal matters. The second involves comparative research on sentencing and the impact of different types of sentencing guidelines. He is also writing up his recent study on the institutionalisation of restorative justice in policing.
Dr Clíodhna Murphy is currently working on research relating to access to labour rights for a number of different categories of domestic worker; and is also taking part in the Northern/Irish Feminist Judgments Project, writing the 'missing' feminist judgment in the Supreme Court decision in Lobe and Osayande v Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform [2003] IESC 3.
Dr Maria Murphy’s research focuses on the intersections of law and technology and places particular emphasis on the appropriate role of law in ensuring sufficient protection of human rights while facilitating the adoption of technologies with broad societal benefit. She is also concerned with the importance of rights for the protection of democracy in the information age. The rights of most importance to her research thus far have been privacy, freedom of expression, and the protection of personal data. Key issues examined in her research include privacy by design, the role of human rights in developing workable standards, and the comprehension gap that can exist between different but connected fields – such as law and computer science – and those operating in different jurisdictions.
Dr John Reynolds is currently working on projects on: states of emergency in colonial and postcolonial legal contexts; Third World Approaches to international criminal law; the political economy of socio-economic rights.
Seth Barrett Tillman is working on a critique of the normative foundations of international law. He is also completing a paper on the scope of impeachment and disqualification under U.S. constitutional law.
Research Seminar Series
The Law Department Seminar Series (LDSS), coordinated by Dr David Doyle, aims to provide a forum through which to explore different areas of law, with a view to developing new ideas. Invited scholars will discuss their academic work and share their knowledge and reflections on various different legal topics.
The seminars take place from 12.00pm - 1.00pm (approx.) on Wednesdays in Semester II- venue to be confirmed.
Attendance is welcome from University staff members and postgraduate (both taught and research) students within the School of Law and Criminology.
Queries regarding the LDSS can be addressed to David at david.doyle@mu.ie.
Subject to speaker consent, the lecture notes and slides may be made available to attendees.
The full schedule will be made available shortly. Please check back for further information.
