Alnylam, Isis reach milestone

Alnylam Pharmaceuticals Inc. of Cambridge said today that it has achieved a key milestone in its collaboration with Isis Pharmaceuticals Inc. of California.

Alnylam is a biopharmaceutical company seeking to develop novel technologies based on RNA interference, or RNAi, a naturally occurring mechanism within cells for selectively silencing and regulating specific genes; because many diseases are caused by the inappropriate activity of specific cells, Alnylam believes that the ability to silence genes selectively through RNAi has great potential.

In 2004, Alnylam obtained an exclusive license to Isis intellectual property for oligonucleotide therapeutics that can mediate RNAi.

"The advancement of RNAi therapeutics into the development stages has occurred at a rapid pace, in part due to the pioneering work of Isis across virtually all categories of oligonucleotide therapeutics," Alnylam chief operating officer Barry Greene said in a statement.
(By Chris Reidy, Globe staff)