CAMBRIDGE, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (Nasdaq: ALNY), a leading RNAi therapeutics company, announced today the presentation of new pre-clinical data from its hypercholesterolemia program, performed in collaboration with the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas, at the XV International Symposium on Atherosclerosis 2009 held in Boston, Mass. from June 14-18, 2009. Alnylam’s ALN-PCS program is focused on using RNAi therapeutics targeting proprotein convertase subtilisin/kexin type 9, or PCSK9, as a novel strategy for reducing LDL (or “bad”) cholesterol. The newly presented data include results with novel lipid nanoparticles (LNPs), developed in collaboration with Tekmira Pharmaceuticals Corporation and University of British Columbia and exclusively licensed to Alnylam, that show significantly improved in vivo potency and the use of certain optimized dosing regimens that also improve potency and enhance durability. Further, the new research findings show that silencing PCSK9 with RNAi therapeutics results in no measurable decrease in HDL (or “good”) cholesterol.
