The third platform technology being commercialized by Angioblast is based on proprietary RNA silencing technology targeting genes involved in blood vessel and heart tissue repair. The first product to be commercialized by Angioblast using this technology is one that inhibits plasminogen activator inhibitor type I (PAI-1).

The PAI-1 gene and protein is routinely found to be increased in heart tissue of patients with heart attacks, chronic heart disease, restenosis and other circulatory illnesses. In addition, diabetics represent a special class of patients with very high levels of PAI-1 present in the blood circulation at all times, and further significant increase in PAI-1 in tissues undergoing ischemia.

Angioblast's PAI-1 inhibitor has been shown to reduce RNA and protein levels of PAI-1 at the site of acute ischemic injury , prevent restenosis following balloon angioplasty in diabetic and non-diabetic animal models, improve limb perfusion and salvage the distal limb in diabetic animal models of peripheral artery disease, and increase blood vessels and protect heart muscle in animal models of heart attack.

Balloon angioplasty and stent placement have become the mainstay of treatment for patients with acute coronary artery occlusion and heart attacks. While these acute procedures are highly effective, early restenosis (within 6-12 months) occurred in as many as 50% of cases when bare-metal stents were used. This problem has been relatively successfully addressed by the use of drug-eluting stents which release agents at the stent site to prevent smooth muscle proliferation. However, anti-proliferative agents have been singularly less successful in the diabetic subset of patients undergoing coronary stent implantation, which accounts for 25% of the stents implanted (over 500,000 in the United States alone). In this group, restenosis continues to be a major impediment to successful stent implantation, with 25-35% continuing to show short-term restenosis.

Angioblast believes it is in a position to develop a unique drug-eluting stent which will demonstrate the greatest degree of effectiveness in preventing restenosis in diabetic patients. This will have broad applicability not only for coronary artery disease, but also for peripheral artery artery disease where over 50% of the 400,000 annual angioplasty procedures performed in the US alone are in diabetics