RNA interference mediated inhibition of Stearoyl-CoA desaturase (SCD) gene expression using short interfering nucelic acid (siNA)

A chemically modified short interfering nucleic acid (siNA) molecule, wherein:

• (a) the siNA molecule comprises a sense strand and a separate antisense strand, each strand having one or more pyrimidine nucleotides and one or more purine nucleotides;
• (b) each strand is independently 18 to 27 nucleotides in length, and together comprise a duplex having between 17 and 23 base pairs;
• (c) the antisense strand is complementary to a human Stearoyl-CoA Desaturase (SCD) RNA sequence comprising SEQ ID NO:811;
• (d) the sense strand comprises 10 or more 2′-deoxy, 2′-O-methyl, 2′-deoxy-2′-fluoro, or universal base modified nucleotides, and a plurality of the pyrimidine nucleotides present in the sense strand are 2′-deoxy-2′-fluoro pyrimidine nucleotides and a plurality of the purine nucleotides present in the sense strand are 2′-deoxy purine nucleotides;
• and
• (e) the antisense strand comprises 10 or more 2′-deoxy, 2′-O-methyl, 2′-deoxy-2′-fluoro, or universal base modified nucleotides, and a plurality of the pyrimidine nucleotides in the antisense strand are 2′-deoxy-2′-fluoro pyrimidine nucleotides and a plurality of the purine nucleotides present in the antisense strand are 2′-O-methyl purine nucleotides.