Therapeutic Prospects of Extracellular Vesicles in Cancer Treatment

Abstract

Extracellular vesicles (EVs) are released by all cells within the tumor microenvironment, such as endothelial cells, tumor-associated fibroblasts, pericytes, and immune system cells. The EVs carry the cargo of parental cells formed of proteins and nucleic acids, which can convey cell-to-cell communication influencing the maintenance and spread of the malignant neoplasm, for example, promoting angiogenesis, tumor cell invasion, and immune escape. However, EVs can also suppress tumor progression, either by the direct influence of the protein and nucleic acid cargo of the EVs or via antigen presentation to immune cells as tumor-derived EVs carry on their surface some of the same antigens as the donor cells. Moreover, dendritic cell-derived EVs carry major histocompatibility complex class I and class II/peptide complexes and are able to prime other immune system cell types and activate an antitumor immune response. Given the relative longevity of vesicles within the circulation and their ability to cross blood–brain barriers, modification of these unique organelles offers the potential to create new biological-tools for cancer therapy. This review examines how modification of the EV cargo has the potential to target specific tumor mechanisms responsible for tumor formation and progression to develop new therapeutic strategies and to increase the efficacy of antitumor therapies.

Intercellular transfer of HLA‐G: its potential in cancer immunology

“…Extracellular vesicles (EVs) are lipid bilayer membrane vesicles with different sizes ranging from 30 to 10 000 nm in diameter and contain different panel of biomaterials such as proteins, lipids and nucleic acids. EVs can be secreted by almost all cell types including cancer cells . However, their different cell of origin makes EVs highly heterogeneous.…”

“…EVs can be secreted by almost all cell types including cancer cells. 47 However, their different cell of origin makes EVs highly heterogeneous. Hitherto, four subtypes of EVs have been recognised based on their size: exosomes (70-150 nm), microvesicles (100-1000 nm), apoptotic bodies (> 500 nm) and oncosomes (> 1000-10 000 nm).…”

Potential roles of extracellular vesicles in the pathophysiology, diagnosis, and treatment of autoimmune diseases

“…In other diseases, such as cancer, EVs also bring new opportunities for treatment, prevention or diagnosis. Some studies have found that proteins or nucleic acid components in EVs can inhibit tumor development [72], which may be a direct influence or through antigen presentation to immune cells. For example, DCs loaded with exosomes and alphagalactosylceramide can significantly improve the tumor microenvironment of rats bearing gliomas and increase the median survival of rats [73].…”

Extracellular Vesicles After Allogeneic Hematopoietic Cell Transplantation: Emerging Role in Post-Transplant Complications

“…Natural killer-derived EVs (NK-EVs), purified from either cell culture supernatants or plasma of healthy volunteers, have been shown to lyse target human tumor cells in vitro (106) and show promising anti-tumor effects in preclinical studies without impacting normal cells (107). Natural killer-derived EVs contain cytolytic and cytotoxic proteins, such as perforin, granzymes A and B, granulysin, and Fas ligand (108,109) able to kill malignant hematologic cell lines (107). However, the underlying mechanisms of specific killing of tumor cells mediated by NK-EVs remain unclear.…”