The risk of narrow protection

A peptide can be used, for example, as a vaccine, while an oligonucleotide can be used to silence a given gene whose expression product is involved in the development of a disease. Normally, biotechnology patent applications disclose a high number of peptides or oligonucleotides. The applicant usually follows this strategy in order to reduce the filing costs by gathering several peptides/oligonucleotides in a single application.