siFECTamineT is superior to in vitro market leader says new Biochemistry paper

London, UK, 26 October - IC-Vec Limited, the Anglo-Japanese biopharmaceutical company focused on siRNA and protein therapeutics, today announced the publication of a landmark study demonstrating the superiority of its proprietary cationic liposomal delivery technology, siFECTamine™ over relevant competitors.  The data from this study suggest that siFECTamine™ should be the new reagent of choice for standard in vitro functional genomics applications.

At the recent BioJapan 2004 meeting, Prof Kazunari Taira (Tokyo University) endorsed siFECTamine™ as being “ the best liposomal siRNA delivery reagent developed so far.” Speaking at the same meeting, Prof Andrew Miller (Imperial College London, IC-Vec Ltd Chairman) said that, “ the development and launch of siFECTamine™ should be of considerable benefit to genomics research.”

In a comparison with lipofectAMINE2000 (1), the current market leader for liposomal delivery of siRNA, siFECTamine™ demonstrated minimal in vitro toxicity towards mammalian cells whilst lipofectAMINE2000 showed the reverse effect. Cellular toxicity will complicate and impair functional genomics data therefore siRNA delivery reagents must be essentially free of cellular toxicity side effects to be of proper use. siFECTamine™ appears to be the first such reagent to be developed with such a low toxicity profile.

The study, published in the October issue of Biochemistry (2), indicates that a possible reason for the low toxicity of siFECTamine™ may be that this reagent induces slower, more controlled uptake and intracellular release of siRNA.

The process of siRNA delivery mediated by cationic liposomes is known as siFection. With the advent of siFECTamine™, siFection should be the preferred mode of siRNA delivery in vitro for all main applications. IC-Vec has also developed the means to upgrade siFECTamine™ for in vivo use through the development of siFECTplus^TM nanoparticles. The results of proof of concept studies using these nanoparticles will be disclosed shortly.

Liposomal delivery is widely believed to be a safer way to deliver siRNA and protein therapeutics than viral delivery.

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1. Sold by Invitrogen

2. S. Spagnou, A. D. Miller and M. Keller. Lipidic Carriers of siRNA: Differences in the Formulation, Cellular Uptake, and Delivery with Plasmid DNA. Biochemistry 2004, in press

Contacts:

At the company:

Matthew Speers

CEO

IC-Vec

t: +44 (0) 20 7594 1057

e: m.speers@icvec.demon.co.uk

Media enquiries:

Dr. Douglas Pretsell

Senior Account Manager

Northbank Communications

t : +44 (0) 20 7886 8158

e:  d.pretsell@northbankcommunications.com

Notes for editors:

1.                   About IC Vec

IC-Vec is an Anglo-Japanese biopharmaceutical company focused on siRNA and protein therapeutics using its proprietary nanoparticle delivery technologies and expertise in lipids and nucleic acids.  The Company has developed several products for in vitro nucleic acid delivery including: siFECTamine ™ (siRNA), PRIMOFect™ (pDNA), Trojene™ (available from Avanti, also for pDNA delivery) and MAGfect™ (pDNA and GD3+ -MRI contrast labels).  IC Vec’s platform CONZENTR_x™ technology can be used in functional genomics research and in diagnostics applications.  In addition IC-Vec has R&D programmes focused on therapies for hepatitis and cancer although its technology is applicable to other therapeutic areas.  The Company is a spin-out from Imperial College London that was founded in December 2001 by members of the Imperial College Genetic Therapies Centre (GTC) with financial backing from Diamond Capital Corporation (DCC), Nikko Ant Factory and Mitsubishi Chemical Corporation (MCC), Japan’s largest chemical company.

For further information please visit the website at www.icvec.com

2.                   The use of synthetic, non-viral vectors in gene therapy

Synthetic non-viral vectors provide one of the most realistic routes to routine clinical siRNA and protein therapeutics. Compared with viral vectors, synthetic non-viral vectors have less apparent toxicity/immunogenicity and associated oncogenicity and should make regulatory review more straight forward. Furthermore, synthetic non-viral vectors are expected to benefit from simpler production and quality control methods.

3.                   Using siFECTamine as synthetic, non-viral vector for functional genomics

siFECTamine , IC-Vec’s proprietary cationic liposome formulation for siRNA delivery (siFection) in vitro, has been specially developed with particular emphasis on the unique needs of investigators engaged in functional genomics programmes. In-house and independent tests, undertaken by prominent academic laboratories and leading pharmaceutical companies, have proven:

·         siFECTamine has superior ability to mediate specific protein down regulation at low siRNA doses.

·         siFECTamine minimises toxic effects that severely compromise functional genomics experiments.

siFECTamine is a liposomal formulation based on IC-Vec’s proprietary cationic lipid CDAN. This novel cholesterol-based polyamine has unique properties enabling it to complex with nucleic acids and mediate their delivery to cells in normal growth medium under serum and antibiotic conditions.  When compared against the top-selling reagents marketed specifically for siFection, siFECTamine has shown superior ability to mediate specific protein down-regulation in vitro.