What is it about?
Exosome-encapsulated microRNAs are being suggested as a new class novel biomarker and diagnostic and predictive markers in colorectal cancer. These particles are released from many cell types into the extracellular space upon fusion of multivesicular bodies (MVB) with the plasma membrane. They contain a wide variety of information, including proteins, lipids, RNAs, non-transcribed RNAs, microRNAs, which can be circulated in various body fluids (e.g., blood, salvia, ascites, urine). Exosomes can be taken up by neighboring or distant cells and thereby modulate the functional of recipient cells and play a key role in disease progression or facilitate metastasis in cancers. The aim of current review is to give an overview about origin and trafficking of exosomes between cells, techniques to isolate exosomal microRNAs as well as the potential applications of exosomeencapsulated microRNAs as diagnostic markers in clinical settings in colorectal cancer. There is growing body of evidence showing the prognostic and diagnostic value of some exosomal microRNAs in colon cancer (e.g., miR- 150, miR-21, miR-192, let-7a, miR-223, and miR-23a). These findings provide a new insight on novel application of these markers as being novel non-invasive biomarkers for early detection and risk assessment of patients with colorectal cancer, although further investigations in larger population are required to explore the clinical utility of exosomal microRNAs in colorectal cancer patients.
Featured Image
Why is it important?
Therefore, identification of novel biomarkers is warranted to recognize CRC patients at earlier stages or predict response to therapy
Perspectives
Exosomes can be circulated in body fluid and transfer the information of cell origin to another organ. This information can be transferred via genetic materials, such as miRNAs. Several studies have reported the potential applications of exosome-encapsulated miRNAs for cancer diagnosis and monitoring of response to therapy (e.g., miR-150, miR-21, miR-192, let-7a, miR-1229, miR-1246, miR-150, miR-21, miR-223, and miR-23a). Further studies on larger and multi-center setting are warranted to investigate the clinical application of these miRNAs in CRC.
Reza Nedaeinia
Student Research Committee, Department of medical biotechnology, School of Medicine, Mashhad University of Medical Sciences, Mashhad, Iran
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Exosome-Encapsulated microRNAs as Potential Circulating Biomarkers in Colon Cancer, Current Pharmaceutical Design, May 2017, Bentham Science Publishers,
DOI: 10.2174/1381612822666161201144634.
You can read the full text:
Contributors
The following have contributed to this page
