Upheaval in the moral economy of science? Patenting, teamwork and the World War II experience of penicillin

Abstract

The development of penicillin can be seen as marking a decisive break with prewar biomedical research but not as launching the new world of ‘Mode 2’ science. The patenting of vitamin D enrichment by Steenbock in the 1920s and the administration of these patents by the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation (WARF) had deepened resistance in the UK, and in some US institutions, to the patenting of life science innovations. The initially negative reaction of the Medical Research Council (MRC) to penicillin patenting must be seen as a response specifically to the vitamin D experience. However MRC came to accept the patenting of innovations in penicillin technology. Similarly teamwork in wartime penicillin development went to unanticipated lengths. Such scientific styles were accepted and seen as paradigmatic for the positive potential of certain kinds of science. Postwar basic science policy can be seen, however, as an attempt to protect some scientific work from the impact of such innovations.