An update in the applications of exosomes in cancer theranostics: from research to clinical trials

Normotensive placental extracellular vesicles provide long-term protection against hypertension and cardiovascular disease

BACKGROUND

Women with normotensive pregnancy are at a reduced risk of developing cardiovascular disease postpartum compared with those who experience hypertensive conditions during pregnancy. However, the underlying mechanisms remain poorly understood. During normotensive pregnancy, vast numbers of placental extracellular vesicles are released into the maternal circulation, which protect endothelial cells from activation and alter maternal vascular tone. We hypothesized that placental extracellular vesicles play a mechanistic role in lowering the risk of cardiovascular disease following normotensive pregnancy.

OBJECTIVE

This study aimed to investigate the long-term effects of placental extracellular vesicles derived from normotensive term placentae on the cardiovascular system and explore the mechanisms underlying their biological effects.

STUDY DESIGN

Spontaneously hypertensive rats were injected with placental extracellular vesicles from normotensive term pregnancies (2 mg/kg each time, n=8) or vehicle control (n=9) at 3 months of age. Blood pressure and cardiac function were regularly monitored from 3 months to 15 months of age. The response of mesenteric resistance arteries to vasoactive substances was investigated to evaluate vascular function. Cardiac remodeling, small artery remodeling, and renal function were investigated to comprehensively assess the impact of placental extracellular vesicles on cardiovascular and renal health.

RESULTS

Compared with vehicle-treated control animals, rats treated with normotensive placental extracellular vesicles exhibited a significantly lower increase in blood pressure and improved cardiac function. Furthermore, the vasodilator response to the endothelium-dependent agonist acetylcholine was significantly enhanced in the normotensive placental extracellular vesicle-treated spontaneously hypertensive rats compared with the control. Moreover, treatment with placental extracellular vesicles reduced wall thickening of small renal vessels and attenuated renal fibrosis.

CONCLUSION

Placental extracellular vesicles from normotensive term pregnancies have long-lasting protective effects reducing hypertension and mitigating cardiovascular damage in vivo.

The Therapeutic Effects of Blueberry-Treated Stem Cell-Derived Extracellular Vesicles in Ischemic Stroke

An ischemic stroke, one of the leading causes of morbidity and mortality, is caused by ischemia and hemorrhage resulting in impeded blood supply to the brain. According to many studies, blueberries have been shown to have a therapeutic effect in a variety of diseases. Therefore, in this study, we investigated whether blueberry-treated mesenchymal stem cell (MSC)-derived extracellular vesicles (B-EVs) have therapeutic effects in in vitro and in vivo stroke models. We isolated the extracellular vesicles using cryo-TEM and characterized the particles and concentrations using NTA. MSC-derived extracellular vesicles (A-EVs) and B-EVs were round with a lipid bilayer structure and a diameter of ~150 nm. In addition, A-EVs and B-EVs were shown to affect angiogenesis, cell cycle, differentiation, DNA repair, inflammation, and neurogenesis following KEGG pathway and GO analyses. We investigated the protective effects of A-EVs and B-EVs against neuronal cell death in oxygen-glucose deprivation (OGD) cells and a middle cerebral artery occlusion (MCAo) animal model. The results showed that the cell viability was increased with EV treatment in HT22 cells. In the animal, the size of the cerebral infarction was decreased, and the behavioral assessment was improved with EV injections. The levels of NeuN and neurofilament heavy chain (NFH)-positive cells were also increased with EV treatment yet decreased in the MCAo group. In addition, the number of apoptotic cells was decreased with EV treatment compared with ischemic animals following TUNEL and Bax/Bcl-2 staining. These data suggested that EVs, especially B-EVs, had a therapeutic effect and could reduce apoptotic cell death after ischemic injury.

The Traces of Dysregulated lncRNAs-Associated ceRNA Axes in Retinoblastoma: A Systematic Scope Review

PURPOSE

Long non-coding RNAs are an essential component of competing endogenous RNA regulatory axes and play their role by sponging microRNAs and interfering with the regulation of gene expression. Because of the broadness of competing endogenous RNA interaction networks, they may help investigate treatment targets in complicated disorders.

METHODS

This study performed a systematic scoping review to assess verified loops of competing endogenous RNAs in retinoblastoma, emphasizing the competing endogenous RNAs axis related to long non-coding RNAs. We used a six-stage approach framework and the PRISMA guidelines. A systematic search of seven databases was done to locate suitable papers published before February 2022. Two reviewers worked independently to screen articles and collect data.

RESULTS

Out of 363 records, fifty-one articles met the inclusion criteria, and sixty-three axes were identified in desired articles. The majority of the research reported several long non-coding RNAs that were experimentally verified to act as competing endogenous RNAs in retinoblastoma: XIST/NEAT1/MALAT1/SNHG16/KCNQ1OT1, respectively. At the same time, around half of the studies investigated unique long non-coding RNAs.

CONCLUSIONS

Understanding the many features of this regulatory system may aid in elucidating the unknown etiology of Retinoblastoma and providing novel molecular targets for therapeutic and clinical applications.

New insights into targeted therapy of glioblastoma using smart nanoparticles

In recent times, the intersection of nanotechnology and biomedical research has given rise to nanobiomedicine, a captivating realm that holds immense promise for revolutionizing diagnostic and therapeutic approaches in the field of cancer. This innovative fusion of biology, medicine, and nanotechnology aims to create diagnostic and therapeutic agents with enhanced safety and efficacy, particularly in the realm of theranostics for various malignancies. Diverse inorganic, organic, and hybrid organic-inorganic nanoparticles, each possessing unique properties, have been introduced into this domain. This review seeks to highlight the latest strides in targeted glioblastoma therapy by focusing on the application of inorganic smart nanoparticles. Beyond exploring the general role of nanotechnology in medical applications, this review delves into groundbreaking strategies for glioblastoma treatment, showcasing the potential of smart nanoparticles through in vitro studies, in vivo investigations, and ongoing clinical trials.

A semi-supervised ensemble clustering algorithm for discovering relationships between different diseases by extracting cell-to-cell biological communications

INTRODUCTION

In recent decades, many theories have been proposed about the cause of hereditary diseases such as cancer. However, most studies state genetic and environmental factors as the most important parameters. It has been shown that gene expression data are valuable information about hereditary diseases and their analysis can identify the relationships between these diseases.

OBJECTIVE

Identification of damaged genes from various diseases can be done through the discovery of cell-to-cell biological communications. Also, extraction of intercellular communications can identify relationships between different diseases. For example, gene disorders that cause damage to the same cells in both breast and blood cancers. Hence, the purpose is to discover cell-to-cell biological communications in gene expression data.

METHODOLOGY

The identification of cell-to-cell biological communications for various cancer diseases has been widely performed by clustering algorithms. However, this field remains open due to the abundance of unprocessed gene expression data. Accordingly, this paper focuses on the development of a semi-supervised ensemble clustering algorithm that can discover relationships between different diseases through the extraction of cell-to-cell biological communications. The proposed clustering framework includes a stratified feature sampling mechanism and a novel similarity metric to deal with high-dimensional data and improve the diversity of primary partitions.

RESULTS

The performance of the proposed clustering algorithm is verified with several datasets from the UCI machine learning repository and then applied to the FANTOM5 dataset to extract cell-to-cell biological communications. The used version of this dataset contains 108 cells and 86,427 promoters from 702 samples. The strength of communication between two similar cells from different diseases indicates the relationship of those diseases. Here, the strength of communication is determined by promoter, so we found the highest cell-to-cell biological communication between "basophils" and "ciliary.epithelial.cells" with 62,809 promoters.

CONCLUSION

The maximum cell-to-cell biological similarity in each cluster can be used to detect the relationship between different diseases such as cancer.

Niosome as an Effective Nanoscale Solution for the Treatment of Microbial Infections

Numerous disorders go untreated owing to a lack of a suitable drug delivery technology or an appropriate therapeutic moiety, particularly when toxicities and side effects are a major concern. Treatment options for microbiological infections are not fulfilled owing to significant adverse effects or extended therapeutic options. Advanced therapy options, such as active targeting, may be preferable to traditional ways of treating infectious diseases. Niosomes can be defined as microscopic lamellar molecules formed by a mixture of cholesterol, nonionic surfactants (alkyl or dialkyl polyglycerol ethers), and sometimes charge-inducing agents. These molecules comprise both hydrophilic and hydrophobic moieties of varying solubilities. In this review, several pathogenic microbes such as Staphylococcus aureus, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Klebsiella pneumoniae, Plasmodium, Leishmania, and Candida spp. have been evaluated. Also, the development of a proper niosomal formulation for the required application was discussed. This review also reviews that an optimal formulation is dependent on several aspects, including the choice of nonionic surfactant, fabrication process, and fabrication parameters. Finally, this review will give information on the effectiveness of niosomes in treating acute microbial infections, the mechanism of action of niosomes in combating microbial pathogens, and the advantages of using niosomes over other treatment modalities.

Promotor methylation in ocular surface squamous neoplasia development: epigenetics implications in molecular diagnosis

INTRODUCTION

Cancer is heavily influenced by epigenetic mechanisms that include DNA methylation, histone modifications, and non-coding RNA. A considerable proportion of human malignancies are believed to be associated with global DNA hypomethylation, with localized hypermethylation at promoters of certain genes.

AREA COVERED

The present review aims to emphasize on recent investigations on the epigenetic landscape of ocular surface squamous neoplasia, that could be targeted/explored using novel approaches such as personalized medicine.

EXPERT OPINION

While the former is thought to contribute to genomic instability, promoter-specific hypermethylation might facilitate tumorigenesis by silencing tumor suppressor genes. Ocular surface squamous neoplasia, the most prevalent type of ocular surface malignancy, is suggested to be affected by epigenetic mechanisms, as well. Although the exact role of epigenetics in ocular surface squamous neoplasia has mostly been unexplored, recent findings have greatly contributed to our understanding regarding this pathology of the eye.