Exosomes in Liquid Biopsy: The Nanometric World in the Pursuit of Precision Oncology

Karmele Valencia, Luis M. Montuenga
2021 Cancers  
Among the different components that can be analyzed in liquid biopsy, the utility of exosomes is particularly promising because of their presence in all biological fluids and their potential for multicomponent analyses. Exosomes are extracellular vesicles with an average size of ~100 nm in diameter with an endosomal origin. All eukaryotic cells release exosomes as part of their active physiology. In an oncologic patient, up to 10% of all the circulating exosomes are estimated to be
more » ... exosomes. Exosome content mirrors the features of its cell of origin in terms of DNA, RNA, lipids, metabolites, and cytosolic/cell-surface proteins. Due to their multifactorial content, exosomes constitute a unique tool to capture the complexity and enormous heterogeneity of cancer in a longitudinal manner. Due to molecular features such as high nucleic acid concentrations and elevated coverage of genomic driver gene sequences, exosomes will probably become the "gold standard" liquid biopsy analyte in the near future.
doi:10.3390/cancers13092147 pmid:33946893 pmcid:PMC8124368 fatcat:y6klxqvkg5c7fj4tzbql4hnwk4