Sidebar: Further Information - Companies Creating Antisense Drugs
At first, researchers thought that antisense drugs would prove so specific there would be few side effects. But toxicity-related problems did arise in initial animal studies of antisense drugs in the early 1990s. Since then, companies are using these compounds cautiously. They are continuing to study new ways to make more effective, less toxic antisense therapeutics by changing their chemistries and formulations.
About a dozen biotech companies "will live or die" based on the success of antisense technology, according to James Hawkins, an industry consultant and a founding editor of the journal Antisense and Nucleic Acid Drug Development. He and others think that that the antisense sector may be poised for expansion.
"The market is large, and most manufacturing issues [such as how to produce large quantities of synthetic nucleic acids] have been solved," explains Peter Drake, executive vice president of Vector ...
