CAMBRIDGE, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--March 16, 2006--Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (Nasdaq: ALNY), a leading RNAi therapeutics company, announced today that its research on therapeutic silencing of microRNAs was featured in an article published in the March 16, 2006 issue of The New England Journal of Medicine. The article titled ‘MicroRNAs as Therapeutic Targets’ was authored by Dr. Michael Czech, Chair of the Program in Molecular Medicine at the University of Massachusetts Medical School, and discussed clinical applications for intervening with microRNAs. microRNAs (miRNAs) are known to regulate a large number of genes in the human genome and their abnormal expression has been linked with disease processes. Research by Alnylam and its collaborators at The Rockefeller University has demonstrated that miRNAs can be specifically silenced by using antagomirs, a novel class of oligonucleotide drugs. Alnylam believes this approach creates the opportunity to design antagomirs that target miRNAs involved in the cause or pathway of human diseases, such as cancer and viral infection.
