Everything about Sierra Sciences totally explained
Sierra Sciences, LLC is a
biotechnology company founded by William H. Andrews, former director of
molecular biology at
Geron Corporation. Andrews founded Sierra Sciences in
1999 in
Reno, Nevada with the goal of preventing and/or reversing
cellular senescence, and ultimately curing diseases associated with human
aging, including the aging process itself.
Background
In humans, aging is strongly correlated with the length of an individual's
telomeres, the repetitive
DNA at the ends of each
chromosome. Each time a cell in the body
divides, its telomeres become shorter. Eventually, telomeres will shorten to the point where the cell is unable to divide (the "
Hayflick limit"). The enzyme
telomerase adds these DNA sequence repeats to the telomere, re-lengthening it. In humans, telomerase is expressed in
embryonic stem cells and some other cells, but most
somatic cells don't express it.
While working at Geron Corporation, Andrews co-discovered the
RNA component of human telomerase ("
hTR"), as well as the
gene for hTR, and was issued U.S.
patent #5,583,016. For this discovery, Andrews was awarded second place as "National Inventor of the Year" in
1997 by the
Intellectual Property Owners Association. Andrews also co-discovered the protein component of human telomerase ("
hTERT") and its gene, for which he was issued U.S. patent #6,261,836. The hTERT gene is present in all human cells, but is
repressed in most.
In
1997, Andrews left Geron, and in 1999 founded Sierra Sciences to pursue the anti-aging implications of these discoveries, intending to find a
drug that would "switch on" this repressed gene.
Company History
At the time of its inception, Sierra Sciences'
President was
Dan Fylstra, founder of
VisiCorp.
In
2002,
Richard Offerdahl, co-founder of
Zycad Corporation and former director of
Digi International, assumed the position of
Chairman of the Board of Sierra Sciences. In
2003, Offerdahl was elected
Chief Operating Officer.
In 2003,
Pierluigi Zappacosta, co-founder of
Logitech, was elected President and
Chief Executive Officer.
Discoveries
In
2001, Sierra Sciences discovered a repressor binding site (dubbed "Site C") that blocks the expression of
telomerase reverse transcriptase ("TERT"). For this discovery, Sierra Sciences was issued U.S. patent #6,686,159 in
2004. Sierra Sciences discovered another repressor bind site, "GC-Box 5," in 2004, for which it was issued patent #7,279,328 in
2007.
Sierra Sciences discovered methods of
assaying TERT promoter modulatory agents, allowing the company to efficiently check a variety of compounds to see if they inhibit repression of hTERT, in
2005. For this discovery, it was issued U.S. patent #7,226,744 in 2007.
In 2007, Sierra Sciences discovered a small-molecule, drug-like compound that turns on the expression of telomerase in human cells. The compound is internally known as "C0057684." The company is presently characterizing its mechanism of action.
Further Information
Get more info on 'Sierra Sciences'.
|
External Link Exchanges
Do you know how hard it is to get a link from a large encyclopaedia? Well we're different and will prove it. To get a link from us just add the following HTML to your site on a relevant page:
<a href="http://sierra_sciences.totallyexplained.com">Sierra Sciences Totally Explained</a>
Then simply click through this link from your web page. Our crawlers will verify your link, extract the title of your web page and instantly add a link back to it. If you like you can remove the words Totally Explained and embed the link in article text.
As long as your link remains in place, we'll keep our link to you right here. Please play fair - our crawlers are watching. Your site must be closely related to this one's topic. Any kind of spamming, dubious practises or removing the link will result in your link from us being dropped and, potentially, your whole site being banned. |
