Title: Screening of microRNA Cluster Inhibitor Pools
Patent Number: 8,367,318
Filed: July 21, 2008
Lead Inventor: Anja Smith, Dharmacon (Thermo Fisher Scientific)
The patent, its abstract states, claims “methods for inhibiting the activity of a miRNA cluster in a cell and ... for screening a cell for a phenotype of interest resulting from inhibition of a miRNA cluster. The methods use a cluster pool which comprises at least one miRNA inhibitor specific for each miRNA in the miRNA cluster.” The miRNA inhibitors “induce apoptosis in breast cancer cells and hence are useful in the treatment of breast cancer.”
Also claimed, the abstract states, are “pharmaceutical compositions … useful for the treatment of breast cancer; methods for inducing the nuclear translocation of NF-kappaB in a breast cancer cell; methods for inducing the nuclear translocation of c-Jun in a breast cancer cell; method for inhibiting the nuclear translocation of NF-kappaB in a breast cancer cell; and methods for providing prognostic medical information relating to breast cancer progression.”
Title: Method for Inhibiting Expression of a Protein in a Hepatocyte
Patent Number: 8,367,630
Filed: Aug. 28, 2009
Lead Inventor: Xianbin Tian, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
The patent application, its abstract states, claims “a method of screening a candidate compound for susceptibility to biliary excretion by a hepatocyte transport protein. In some embodiments, the method can comprise inhibiting expression of the transport protein. Expression of the transport protein can be inhibited through introduction of a RNA having a sequence corresponding to a coding strand of the gene encoding the transport protein into the hepatocyte.”
Title: Methods of Treating B Cell Cancers
Patent Number: 8,367,633
Filed: Aug. 6, 2008
Lead Inventor: Luojing Chen, University of Rochester
The invention, the patent application's abstract states, relates to “methods of causing malignant B cells and treating malignant B cells. These methods involve the use of an inhibitor of PKK activity, whether active directly against PKK or effective to knockdown PKK expression, which when introduced into a malignant B cell, or administered to a patient, is effective to cause cell death of the malignant B cell, thereby treating the B cell malignancy.”
Inhibitors of the invention include RNAi agents, the patent application states.
Title: Pharmaceutical Composition for Treating Cancer
Application Number: 20130028957
Filed: Nov. 1, 2010
Lead Inventor: Misun Won, Korean Research Institute of Bioscience & Biotechnology
The invention, the patent application's abstract states, “provides a pharmaceutical composition for treating cancer, comprising at least one selected from deoxyribonucleic acids for encoding small interfering RNA [that] complementarily binds to the base sequence of the transcript of the FLJ25416 gene ... which is known to be expressed in cancer cells. … The composition of the present invention can be used as a novel anti-cancer agent.”
Titles: Novel RNAi Therapeutic for Treatment of Hepatitis C Infection
Application Numbers: 20130028964, 20130028965
Filed: Oct. 2, 2012
Inventor: Hengli Tang, Florida State University
The invention, the patent applications' abstracts state, comprises siRNAs and shRNAs that target human cyclophilin A to inhibit hepatitis C infection. “Such siRNA and shRNAs may have a length of from about 19 to about 29 contiguous nucleotides corresponding to a specific region of human cyclophilin A cDNA. … Such siRNA and shRNAs may be formulated as naked compositions or pharmaceutical compositions. DNA polynucleotides, plasmids, and viral or non-viral vectors are also provided that encode siRNA or shRNA molecules, which may be delivered directly to cells or in combination with delivery agents, such as lipids, polymers, encapsulated lipid particles, such as liposomes. Methods for treating, managing, inhibiting, [and] preventing ... HCV infection using such siRNA and shRNAs and compositions comprising same are also provided.”
Title: Suppressors of RNA Silencing as Modulators of miRNA Levels
Application Number: 20130029417
Filed: Feb. 18, 2011
Lead Inventor: Maria Cecilia Sarmiento Guerin, Tallinn University of Technology
The invention, the patent application's abstract states, comprises “RNA silencing suppressors or interactors of the suppressors to bring the expression of microRNAs involved in any disease, including malignant neoplasia, back to its normal level. More specifically, the … invention provides a method to regulate many miRNAs at the same time. Most of the suppressors according to this invention are coded by plant viruses that unexpectedly can affect RNA silencing and modulate miRNA expression levels in mammalian cells. Also suppressors of endogenous origin are described as able to modulate miRNA expression levels.”
Title: Genetic Inhibition by Double-Stranded RNA
Application Number: 20130029425
Filed: July 25, 2012
Lead Inventor: Andrew Fire, Carnegie Institution
The invention comprises “a process … of introducing an RNA into a living cell to inhibit gene expression of a target gene in that cell,” the patent application's abstract states. “The process may be practiced ex vivo or in vivo. The RNA has a region with double-stranded structure. Inhibition is sequence-specific in that the nucleotide sequences of the duplex region of the RNA and of a portion of the target gene are identical. The ... invention is distinguished from prior art interference in gene expression by antisense or triple-strand methods.”
Title: RNAi Modulation of RSV and Therapeutic Uses Thereof
Application Number: 20130030037
Filed: Aug. 7, 2012
Inventor: Rachel Meyers, Alnylam Pharmaceuticals
The invention, the patent application's abstract states, is “based on the in vivo demonstration that RSV can be inhibited through intranasal administration of iRNA agents, as well as by parenteral administration of such agents. Further, it is shown that effective viral reduction can be achieved with more than one virus being treated concurrently. Based on these findings, the ... invention provides general and specific compositions and methods that are useful in reducing RSV mRNA levels, RSV protein levels and viral titers in a subject. These findings can be applied to other respiratory viruses.”
Title: Nucleic Acids for Targeting Multiple Regions of the HCV Genome
Application Number: 20130030042
Filed: Sept. 4, 2012
Inventor: Linda Cuoto, Children's Hospital of Philadelphia
The patent application, its abstract states, claims “compositions and methods effective for modulating Hepatitis C viral infection.”
Such compositions include a microRNA cassette comprising nucleic acids targeting multiple regions of the HCV genome, the application notes.