BioCentury
ARTICLE | Cover Story

Focusing siRNA on the spleen

October 20, 2011 7:00 AM UTC

Separate academic teams have collaborated with Alnylam Pharmaceuticals Inc. to target small interfering RNAs to immune cells residing in the spleen. The therapeutics silence inflammatory or antigen-presenting immune cells before they migrate to tissues where they can cause immunopathology.1,2

The first team, led by researchers from Harvard Medical School and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, focused on using siRNA to inhibit the migration of inflammatory monocytes or progeny macrophages from the spleen to peripheral tissues. Those immune cells play a role in diseases such as atherosclerosis and cancer...