CAMBRIDGE, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (Nasdaq: ALNY), a leading RNAi therapeutics company, today announced the publication of a new study in Cell Host & Microbe on the role of a host gene, heme oxygenase-1 (HO-1), in the cause and pathway of malaria parasitic infection. The collaboration was led by scientists at Unidade de Malária in Portugal, and included scientists at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Roche Kulmbach GmbH (formerly Alnylam Europe AG), and Alnylam. In the new research, in vivo studies demonstrated that HO-1 is a critical host factor involved in the liver stage of malaria infection in a mouse model. Results from the studies showed that RNAi therapeutics that silence HO-1 can significantly inhibit the initial liver stage of malaria infection and completely block the resulting transmission of disease to red blood cells.
