Article 9/8 - Possible cure for cancer and diseases

http://www.popsci.com/science/article/2010-07/rx-every-disease

This article from popular science talks about the use of protein killers to treat cancer and other various illnesses. The idea of this comes from a biotechnology company called Alnylam, which had great success when it tested a protein killing drug on liver cancer patients after chemotherapy had not worked. The science behind the drug is that RNA makes copies of strands of DNA. These single strands, called mRNA, signal cells to make proteins. In the human body, RNAi regulates these functions. So what Alnylam did was make a synthetic RNA strand that matches the one for specific functions of a cancerous cell: blood vessel production, and overly rapid cell division. The RNAi in the patients bodies recognized this and stopped the production of protein by that strand, causing the tumor to stop growing. There are hopes that this idea could be used to treat many illnesses just by using synthetic RNA strands. The author's purpose is to inform a person with little background knowledge of cell biology of a possible cure for cancer. The intended audience is a person who has interest in biotechnology and other science subjects. A rhetorical element is process analysis.