Exosomes: Biogenesis, Isolation Techniques, Applications, and Therapeutic Potential
An overview
Abstract
Exosomes are nanosized with extracellular vesicles (40–160 nm) that play a vital role in inter cellular communication by transporting proteins, lipids, and nucleic acids between cells. Once considered merely cellular waste products, they are now widely recognized for their significant involvement in both physiological and pathological processes, including cancer progression, neurodegenerative diseases, and immune system regulation. One of their most important features is their ability to reflect the molecular composition of their parent cells, making them highly valuable as potential biomarkers for disease diagnosis and prognosis. This review provides an overview of exosome bio-genesis, highlighting how they are formed and released from cells. It also examines their key advantages, such as stability, bio-compatibility, and the ability to cross biological barriers, along with their disadvantages and current limitations, including challenges in large-scale production and standardization.
Keywords:
Exosomes, Drug delivery, Extracellular vesicles, Cancer therapy, Biomarkers, Nanotechnology
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References
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2.Simons M, Raposo G. 2009. Exosomes–vesicular carriers for intercellular communication. Curr Opin Cell Biol. 21(4), 575–581.
3.Pluchino S, Smith JA. 2019. Explicating exosomes: reclassifying the rising stars of intercellular communication. Cell. 177(2), 225–227.
4.Trams EG, Lauter CJ, Salem N Jr, Heine U. 1981. Exfoliation of membrane ecto-enzymes in the form of microvesicles. Biochim Biophys Acta Biomembr. 645, 63–70.
5.Gould SJ, Raposo G. 2013. As we wait: coping with an imperfect nomenclature for extracellular vesicles. J Extracell Vesicles. 2, 20389.
6.Lasser C, Alikhani VS, Ekstrom K, et al. 2011. Human saliva, plasma, and breast milk exosomes contain RNA: uptake by macrophages. J Transl Med. 9, 9.
7.Admyre C, Grunewald J, Thyberg J, et al. 2003. Exosomes with MHC class II and co-stimulatory molecules in BAL fluid. Eur Respir J. 22, 578–583.
8.Andre F, Schwartz NE, Movassagh M, et al. 2002. Malignant effusions and tumour-derived exosomes. Lancet. 360, 295–305.
9.Valadi H, Ekstrom K, Bossios A, et al. 2007. Exosome-mediated transfer of mRNAs and microRNAs. Nat Cell Biol. 9, 654–659.
10.van Niel G, D’Angelo G, Raposo G. 2018. Cell biology of extracellular vesicles. Nat Rev Mol Cell Biol. 19, 213–228.
11.McAndrews KM, Kalluri R. 2019. Mechanisms of exosome biogenesis in cancer. Mol Cancer. 18, 52.
12.Mathieu M, Martin-Jaular L, Lavieu G, Thery C. 2019. Secretion and uptake of exosomes. Nat Cell Biol. 21, 9–17.
13.Shurtleff MJ, Temoche-Diaz MM, Schekman R. 2018. Extracellular vesicles and cancer. Annu Rev Cancer Biol. 2, 395–411.
14.Willms E, Cabanas C, Mager I, Wood MJA, Vader P. 2018. EV heterogeneity and functions in cancer. Front Immunol. 9, 738.
15.Thery C, Witwer KW, Aikawa E, et al. 2018. MISEV2018 guidelines. J Extracell Vesicles. 7, 1535750.
16. Harding C, Heuser J, Stahl P. 1983. Transferrin receptor recycling. J Cell Biol. 97, 329–339.
17. Cocozza F, Grisard E, Martin-Jaular L, Mathieu M, Thery C. 2020. SnapShot: extracellular vesicles. Cell. 182, 262.
18.Lobb RJ, Becker M, Wen SW, et al. 2015. Optimized exosome isolation protocol. J Extracell Vesicles. 4.
19. McKiernan J, Donovan MJ, O’Neill V, et al. 2016. Urine exosome assay for prostate cancer. JAMA Oncol. 2(7), 882–889.
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21.Li P, Chen J, Chen Y, et al. 2023. Exosome SORL1 detection platform. Small. 19, e2207381.
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28.Guo S, Huang F, Guo P. 2006. pRNA-siRNA delivery system. Gene Ther. 13, 814–820.
29. Pi F, Binzel DW, Lee TJ, et al. 2018. RNA loading in EVs. Nat Nanotechnol. 13, 82–89.
30. Shu D, Li H, Shu Y, et al. 2015. Anti-miRNA delivery. ACS Nano. 9, 9731–9740.
31. Yin H, Wang H, Li Z, et al. 2019. RNA micelles for cancer targeting. ACS Nano. 13, 706–717.
32. Chitti SV, Fonseka P, Mathivanan S. 2018. EVs in cancer cachexia. Biochem Soc Trans. 46, 1129–1136.
33. Sagar G, et al. 2016. Exosome-induced lipolysis. Gut. 65, 1165–1174.
34. Vitha AE, Kollefrath AW, Huang CC, Garcia-Godoy F. 2019. Exosomes in orthopedics. Stem Cells Dev. 28, 141–150.
35. Popowski K, Lutz H, Hu S, et al. 2020. Exosome therapeutics in lung regeneration. J Extracell Vesicles. 9, 1785161.
36. Das CK, Jena BC, Banerjee I, et al. 2019. Exosome drug delivery. Mol Pharm. 16, 24–40.
37. Xu Z, Zeng S, Gong Z, Yan Y. 2020. Exosome-based immunotherapy. Mol Cancer. 19, 160.
38. Tang Z, Li D, Hou S, Zhu X. 2020. Cancer exosomes: clinical implications. Int J Cancer.
39. Kojima R, Bojar D, Rizzi G, et al. 2018. Designer exosomes for Parkinson’s. Nat Commun. 9, 1305.
40. Zhang B, Wu X, Zhang X, et al. 2015. MSC exosomes and angiogenesis. Stem Cells Transl Med. 4, 513–522.
41. Li S, Xu J, Qian J, Gao X. 2020. Engineering EVs for cancer therapy. Biomater Sci. 8, 6978–6991.
42.Hazrati A, Mirsanei Z, Heidari N, et al. 2023. Encapsulated exosomes. Biomed Pharmacother. 162, 114615.
Published
26/10/2026
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Allam, S. (2026). Exosomes: Biogenesis, Isolation Techniques, Applications, and Therapeutic Potential: An overview. Journal of Innovations in Applied Pharmaceutical Science (JIAPS), 11(2), 49-53. https://doi.org/10.37022/jiaps.v11i2.831
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