Exosomes: trash bags, messengers and Trojan horses

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Hi all!

So... I'll be blogging some sciency stuff in this group during the next weeks. I'm a PhD graduate student in biomedical and veterinary sciences, and here you can see me working in the lab:

Prelim stress by Azifri

I'll be posting mostly about my thesis and related subjects, which has to do with generating induced pluripotent stem cells from livestock species such as the cow... cool stuff! And before I forget, English is not my 1st language, so please excuse the mistakes <3 Feel free to correct.

But this isn't about stem cells. I have recently been studying about exosomes -small vesicles that our cells secrete into the extracellular environment- that are actually more important than scientist used to believe.

Until some years ago, people used to think they were some kind of trash bags our cells used to get rid of stuff they don't need. However, during the past years evidence has shown that they actually carry all kinds of useful components such as proteins and RNA.

Cell secreting exosomes, by Keith Kasnot

So what is the problem?

Well, virus can also pack their own RNA into exosomes and send it to other cells, making these cells more vulnerable to viral infection. It particularly struck me reading a paper that described how the cells of people that asymptomatically carry HIV are in fact secreting exosomes with HIV signals (www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23…)

Even more: cancer cells can also do the same. When I first learned about how cancer generates metastasis, the theory was that some cancer cells would leave the main tumor, go into the blood stream, and then end somewhere else in the body. Now we know that cancer cells can pack their RNA into exosomes and ship it around our body. I have to say the idea made me feel uncomfortable.

What are the good news then?

Scientists are trying to develop methods to use exosomes as non invasive markers for diseases. In other words, because the content of the exosomes changes depending on what is happening with the cells, they could be used to early diagnose diseases just by taking a blood sample. Also, it may be possible to use them to deliver drugs for treating diseases. The same that cancer cells and viruses do to transmit disease, but in this case to transfer beneficial molecules.

Want to know more? Check out this short video (easy language and less than 4 minutes ^^)


Thanks for reading. Let me know what you think or if you want to add something.
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X0S0ME's avatar
Very nicely done, Azifri! I hope there will be more posts soon. Take care and stay frosty.