Exosome identification for personalized diagnosis and therapy

Exosomes which are nano-sized vesicles secreted from cell to extracellular fluid have received an emerging interest because it has been believed that they have specialized function such as stimulating immune system and play a key role in many biological events including coagulation as well as intracellular communication. Therefore, exosomes can be applied as a diagnostic tool to discover the disease mechanism and moreover, by loading drugs in exosomes, we can expect a personalized therapy. Consequently, diverse studies to analyze exosomes are being carried out. Isolation and detection methods for exosomes are required to investigate the process of exosomes and its subsequent functions. Since the size of exosome is below the detection limit of conventional detection methods, there is a difficulty in detecting exosomes. Also, although lots of studies have figured out detecting methods for exosomes, no standard method has been established yet. Here we show diverse detection methods which are practical for exosomes. We will introduce studies those have succeeded in detecting exosomes. For those methods, brief information of the principle, the detection limit and the kind of information, like morphology, structure, and biomarker for exosomes, will be offered. Also, for most of the cases, figure will show the screen of the instrument which observer will see. The objective of this review is to give an overview of feasible methods for detecting exosomes.