Last week, Senator Tillis' latest literary foray took the form of a letter to the Hon. Drew Hirschfeld, current Commissioner of Patents and Acting Director of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. In it, the Senator asks the USPTO to "publish a request for information on the current state of patent eligibility jurisprudence in the United States, evaluate the responses, and provide us with a detailed summary of your finding, particularly with regard to "how the current jurisprudence has adversely impacted investment and innovation in critical technologies like quantum computing, artificial intelligence, precision medicine, diagnostic methods, and pharmaceutical treatments." The letter illustrates and justifies the request by reciting the "lack of consistency and clarity in our nation's patent eligibility laws." These circumstances have "had a dramatic negative impact on investment, research, and innovation," not only discouraged investment in critical emerging technologies, but also led the courts to foreclose protection entirely for certain important inventions in the diagnostics, biopharmaceutical, and life sciences industries." Of course, the letter references the struggle to "contain and treat the worst global pandemic in more than one hundred years" and professes astonishment that current jurisprudence "makes it virtually impossible to obtain many patents in the diagnostic methods and precision medicine sectors." The letter asks for the report to be delivered to Congress no later than March 2022.