Reading the constitutional and statutory definitions of patentable subject matter, it would seem that you could patent almost anything. The Constitution gives Congress the power to grant "inventors the exclusive right to their … discoveries." The most recent provision by Congress on patentable subject matter, 35 U.S.C. §101, enacted in 1952, allows a patent to be obtained on "any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof."