Now a similar sea change may be afoot, thanks to a new technology called RNA interference, or RNAi, which allows scientists to stop a disease by silencing a particular gene.

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Starr, the former Millennium CFO, has been pursuing a similar strategy, too, helping recently to get Alnylam, a young biotech exploring an entirely new way of making drugs using a technology called RNA interference, off the ground.

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Sirna has been in the news of late because Andrew Fire and Craig Mello, the discoverers of the technology upon which Sirna's drugs are based--RNA interference, or RNAi-- won a Nobel Prize for medicine last month.

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