When Soren Anderson opened his morning newspaper recently, he noticed a headline about an award-winning new medicine. As he read the article, Soren grew intrigued by the thought that this new medicine that fights high blood pressure in a unique way might help in his long fight against the disease.

Soren Anderson

Growing up in Denmark, Soren was an avid athlete, playing football as well as boxing and swimming. When he was diagnosed with high blood pressure at age 23, he took little notice and did not follow his doctor’s directions to control it. That changed when, at the age of 36, Soren had the first of three strokes and suddenly realized the importance of bringing his blood pressure under control.

When Soren was first diagnosed, some medications prescribed by his doctor had significant side effects that limited their use while others did not do enough to reduce his blood pressure to the target level.

About the same time, scientists were looking for new ways to control high blood pressure but a prime focus was actually an old idea: the Renin System. The Renin System, a chemical cascade found largely in the kidney, had long been viewed as a key regulator of blood pressure.

Since 1898 - when a Finnish foctor (Robert Tigerstedt) and a Swedish doctor (Per Bergman) discovered renin, the enzyme that activates the Renin System - researchers had speculated about the benefits of effectively controlling this system and the possibility of trying to control the Renin System at its starting point, renin. Actually developing a successful ‘direct renin inhibitor’ proved to be very difficult, however. For more than 30 years, dozens of renin research programs around the world started, only to fail after hitting scientific roadblocks. Sometimes the experimental molecules were too large to be absorbed into the bloodstream and sometimes the molecules were too expensive to make or simply not effective in lowering blood pressure.

Then in the 1990s Novartis scientists in Basel, Switzerland took up the challenge of finding an effective direct renin inhibitor. Building on earlier lessons and challenges, these researchers took a new approach. Using sophisticated technology to map the structure of renin and new drug design technology, they developed ways to produce direct renin inhibitors that were smaller, less costly, and more effective than earlier ones. The result of their work was aliskiren, the first direct renin inhibitor to successfully complete clinical development and become available to doctors and patients like Soren to treat high blood pressure.

Winning the Gold

Each year The Wall Street Journal Technology Innovation Awards honor technological breakthroughs in areas such as medicine, software, the Internet, wireless and consumer electronics. These innovations can be in the form of new products, patents, inventions or services – but they must represent advances that go beyond marginal improvements in existing products and services. Each year an independent panel of judges reviews the applications and selects winners.

This year’s Gold Award winner across all categories – selected from more than 800 entries - was aliskiren, a new high blood pressure medicine. Aliskiren – known by brand names Rasilez and Tekturna - is the world’s first approved direct renin inhibitor and fights high blood pressure in a distinct new way. During 2007, both the US Food and Drug Administration and regulatory authorities in the European Union approved Tekturna/Rasilez for use alone, or in combination with other high blood pressure medicines.

On winning on the top prize, Dr. Ameet Nathwani, Global Head Cardiovascular and Metabolism, Clinical Development and Medical Affairs at Novartis Pharma AG said, “The team is extremely proud that, after the decades-long search for the first effective direct renin inhibitor, The Wall Street Journal selected aliskiren for this award.”

Read the expert interview

Back to all feature stories