CARLSBAD, Calif. & CAMBRIDGE, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Isis Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (Nasdaq: ISIS) and Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (Nasdaq: ALNY) announced today that a key patent was issued by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). The U.S. patent (U.S. Patent No. 7,138,517 or “ ’517 patent”) broadly covers certain chemical modifications of oligonucleotides used to introduce “drug-like” properties in antisense oligonucleotides, including small interfering RNAs (siRNAs), the molecules that mediate RNA interference (RNAi). The issued patent is owned by Isis and is licensed exclusively to Alnylam for double-stranded RNAi therapeutic applications pursuant to the terms of their 2004 collaboration and license agreement.
