There is some positive news out of Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, Inc headquarters today on the liver cancer front. Alnylam announced that they are beginning Phase I trials on the ALN-VSP cancer treatment. The initial human trials will begin with 55 patients who are suffering from solid cancerous tumors involving the liver. The goal of these phase I trials is to evaluate the tolerability, and safety of the drug, while also figuring out the maximum tolerated does. The company says that the drug reduces blood flow to the liver tumors, thus making them unable to develop blood vessels to grow and spread. The following is a quote from the press release that Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, Inc has recently released regarding the trials:

“We are excited to have initiated this Phase I trial as it represents an important milestone in Alnylam’s efforts to advance RNAi therapeutics for the treatment of cancer. ALN-VSP is also Alnylam’s first clinical program employing systemic delivery. Moreover, in this program we are targeting two well-validated genes critical for tumor proliferation and survival, an attractive strategy for the advancement of novel anti-cancer medicines,” said Akshay Vaishnaw, M.D., Ph.D., Senior Vice President, Clinical Research at Alnylam. “More than one million liver cancer patients are diagnosed annually, and currently have limited therapeutic options and extremely poor survival rates. Over time and as we aim to demonstrate safety and efficacy for ALN-VSP, we hope that our efforts will provide patients a meaningful treatment option for their disease.”