Japan’s Supreme Court has ruled that only a human can be recognized as an inventor under the country’s patent law, rejecting an appeal that sought to list an artificial intelligence (AI) system as the creator of an invention, local media reported Friday.

In a decision issued Wednesday, the court’s Second Petty Bench dismissed a lawsuit filed by a US engineer who challenged the rejection of his patent application by Japan’s Patent Office, according to The Japan News.

The court upheld rulings by the Tokyo District Court and the Intellectual Property High Court, which had dismissed the plaintiff’s request, noting that inventors under the Patent Law are restricted to “natural persons.”

The engineer argued that the denial was unlawful because the invention had been autonomously generated by an AI system.

The case involved a 2020 patent application related to food containers and other products. In the filing, the engineer named the inventor as “DABUS,” an AI system he developed, describing it as the entity that independently created the invention.

Japanese patent authorities rejected the application and instructed the applicant to provide the name of a human inventor. When he refused, the application was formally denied. (AA)