Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is a progressive and fatal motor neuron degenerative disease, and it is hard to diagnose in the early stage, and treatment means are limited, and the treatment effect is unsatisfactory. Therefore, exploring a new effective treatment strategy is urgently needed for ALS patients. Extracellular vesicles (EVs) are a heterogeneous group of natural membrane vesicles containing many bioactive substances, and they play important roles in the paracrine pathway and exhibit neuroprotection effects. A growing body of evidence shows that EVs have great application potential in diagnosis, treatment, and drug delivery in ALS, and they represent an innovative treatment strategy for ALS. In this review, we will briefly introduce the biogenesis of EVs and focus on discussing the role of EVs in ALS treatment to further enrich and boost the development of EVs as an innovative treatment strategy for ALS.

Background The role of H. pylori infection has been reported in various extragastric diseases, particularly, the correlation between H. pylori and atherosclerosis (AS) have received lots of attention. Some scholars demonstrated that the presence of H. pylori‐specific DNA in the sclerotic plaques of atheromatous patients provides biological evidences, with indicating that H. pylori infection is a potential factor of AS. However, the underlying mechanism of H. pylori or their products cross the epithelial barriers to enter the blood circulation remains unclear. Recent studies have shown that the extracellular vesicles (EVs) derived from H. pylori‐infected gastric epithelial cells encapsulated H. pylori virulence factor cytotoxin‐associated gene A (CagA) and existed in the blood samples of patients or mice, which indicating that they can carry CagA into the blood circulation. Based on these findings, some researchers proposed a hypothesis that H. pylori is involved in the pathogenesis of AS via EVs‐based mechanisms. In addition, outer membrane vesicles (OMVs) serve as transport vehicles to deliver H. pylori virulence factors to epithelial cells. It is necessary to discuss the role of H. pylori OMVs in the development of AS. Objectives This review will focus on the correlation between H. pylori infection and AS and tried to unveil the possible role of EVs from H. pylori‐infected cells and H. pylori OMVs in the pathogenesis of AS, with a view to providing help in refining our knowledge in this aspect. Methods All of information included in this review was retrieved from published studies on H. pylori infection in AS. Results H. pylori infection may be an atherosclerotic risk factor and drives researchers to reevaluate the role of H. pylori in the pathogenesis of AS. Some findings proposed a new hypothesis that H. pylori may be involved in the pathogenesis of AS through EVs‐based mechanisms. Besides EVs from H. pylori‐infected cells, whether H. pylori OMVs may play some role in the pathogenesis of AS is still remain unclear. Conclusion Existing epidemiological and clinical evidence had shown that there is a possible association between H. pylori and AS. However, except for the larger randomized controlled trials, more basic research about EVs from H. pylori‐infected cells and H. pylori OMVs is the need of the hour to unveil the possible role of H. pylori infection in the pathogenesis of AS.

Triplex-forming oligonucleotides (TFOs) can bind to the major groove of double-stranded DNA with high specificity and affinity and inhibit gene expression. Triplex-forming oligonucleotides have gained prominence because of their potential applications in antigene therapy. In particular, the target specificity of triplex-forming oligonucleotides combined with their ability to suppress oncogene expression has driven their development as anti-cancer agents. So far, triplex-forming oligonucleotides have not been used for clinical treatment and seem to be gradually snubbed in recent years. But triplex-forming oligonucleotides still represent an approach to down-regulate the expression of the target gene and a carrier of active substances. Therefore, in the present review, we will introduce the characteristics of triplex-forming oligonucleotides and their anti-cancer research progress. Then, we will discuss the challenges in their application.

Erythrocytes are responsible for delivering oxygen throughout the body. They have become suitable drug carriers due to outstanding advantages, such as a long lifespan in circulation, high biosafety, and low immunogenicity. Although erythrocyte-based drug delivery has good application prospects and has become a research hotspot in related fields, the application of erythrocyte-based drug delivery systems is rare in the clinic now. In this review, we discuss the characteristics of erythrocytes, diverse drug-loading approaches, and research progress of erythrocyte-based drug delivery systems. Finally, we explore the challenges of erythrocyte-based drug delivery in clinical application.