aTyr Pharma expands intellectual property portfolio, receives its fifteenth patent

aTyr Pharma announced today that the US Patent office has issued patent US 7,572,452 B2, titled "Method for Stimulating Wound Healing." aTyr Pharma is the sole assignee of this patent, and Professor Sunghoon Kim, a scientific co-founder of aTyr Pharma, is the inventor. An example of aTyr Pharma's broad intellectual property portfolio and the fifteenth filed patent related to aTyr Pharma's work in tRNA synthetases, this patent covers new extracellular activities for p43, a critical protein component of the multi-aminoacyl tRNA synthetase complex in humans. The aminoacyl tRNA synthetases are universal and essential elements of the protein synthesis machinery found in all organisms, but human synthetases and their associated proteins have naturally occurring resected variants, called "resectins," with potent cell signaling activities that are vital to normal functioning of humans. The resectins' activities are distinct from the protein synthesis activities commonly known for synthetases, and aTyr Pharma is discovering and developing the resectins as new biotherapeutic agents that can be used to treat a wide variety of human diseases including inflammatory, autoimmune, hematopoietic and metabolic disorders.

Jeff Watkins, CEO of aTyr Pharma, had this to say about the patent: "This patent covers discoveries Professor Kim has made for extracellular activity of the p43 component of the multi-sythetase complex. As part of aTyr Pharma's portfolio, this patent helps establish our dominant ownership and leadership in the resectin space. Capitalizing on this new area of biology, we are identifying and developing these naturally occurring resectins as candidate biotherapeutics for treating a wide variety of diseases."

Professor Kim, of Seoul National University in Korea, has had a long scientific relationship with Professor Paul Schimmel of The Scripps Research Institute and a co-founder of aTyr Pharma. According to Professor Schimmel, "Professor Kim's research has really helped build our understanding of how far-reaching the non-canonical functions are for naturally occurring resectins of tRNA synthetases and their associated proteins. This newly issued patent highlights the innovation surrounding the discovery and development of tRNA synthetase resectins as biotherapeutics." Professors Schimmel and Kim recently co-authored a scientific article in the Proceedings of the Natural Academy of Sciences (PNAS USA, 2008, vol. 105: 11043-11409) describing many of the newly emerging functions of tRNA synthetases and the relationships to human medicine.

Link to the PNAS review article: http://www.pnas.org/content/105/32/11043.full.pdf