Exosomes and Microvesicles
Dildar Savcı1, Gamze Işık1, Saliha Hızlıok1, Oytun Erbaş1
1ERBAS Institute of Experimental Medicine, Illinois, USA & Gebze, Türkiye
Keywords: Exosomes, extracellular vesicles, stem cell, mesenchymal stem cell, microvesicle.
Abstract
Extracellular vesicles (EVs) are released by all cells and have a variety of physiological functions. Microvesicles (MV), exosomes, oncosomes, and apoptotic bodies, are the four forms of EVs. Exosomes are spherical EV with an endocytic double-layered lipid membrane. As for their identification, it's based on isolation methods, cell type, and cell surface markers. Moreover, their functions differ according to the cell from which they are obtained. They are involved in the immune system, neural communication, drug delivery, and many other processes. Another type of EV is MVs, which are a diverse collection of vesicles formed by the outward budding of the plasma membrane. Differentiating these two types of EVs is mostly based on the process of biogenesis. MVs play a variety of pathological and physiological roles. MVs were hypothesized to have a role in the immunomodulatory function of mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs). Following that, it was discovered that MVs secreted by damaged cells send precise signals to MSCs. Given their physiological contact with the target cell, MVs are regarded to be therapeutic targets in cancer treatment. This chapter provides information about exosomes and microvesicles, which are extracellular vesicles.
Cite this article as: Savcı D, Işık G, Hızlıok S, Erbaş O. Exosomes and Microvesicles. JEB Med Sci 2024;5(1):19-32.
The authors declared no conflicts of interest with respect to the authorship and/or publication of this article.
The authors received no financial support for the research and/or authorship of this article.