Zhand Sareh, Goss Dale Mark, Cheng Yuen Yee, Warkiani Majid Ebrahimi
School of Biomedical Engineering, University of Technology Sydney, Sydney, NSW, 2007, Australia.
Institute for Biomedical Materials and Devices, Faculty of Science, University of Technology Sydney, Sydney, NSW, 2007, Australia.
Adv Healthc Mater. 2025 Feb;14(4):e2401295. doi: 10.1002/adhm.202401295. Epub 2024 Dec 20.
Small extracellular vesicles (sEVs) are membranous vesicles released from cellular structures through plasma membrane budding. These vesicles contain cellular components such as proteins, lipids, mRNAs, microRNAs, long-noncoding RNA, circular RNA, and double-stranded DNA, originating from the cells they are shed from. Ranging in size from ≈25 to 300 nm and play critical roles in facilitating cell-to-cell communication by transporting signaling molecules. The discovery of sEVs in bodily fluids and their involvement in intercellular communication has revolutionized the fields of diagnosis, prognosis, and treatment, particularly in diseases like cancer. Conventional methods for isolating and analyzing sEVs, particularly their nucleic acid content face challenges including high costs, low purity, time-consuming processes, limited standardization, and inconsistent yield. The development of microfluidic devices, enables improved precision in sorting, isolating, and molecular-level separation using small sample volumes, and offers significant potential for the enhanced detection and monitoring of sEVs associated with cancer. These advanced techniques hold great promise for creating next-generation diagnostic and prognostic tools given their possibility of being cost-effective, simple to operate, etc. This comprehensive review explores the current state of research on microfluidic devices for the detection of sEV-derived nucleic acids as biomarkers and their translation into practical point-of-care and clinical applications.
小细胞外囊泡（sEVs）是通过细胞膜出芽从细胞结构释放的膜性囊泡。这些囊泡包含细胞成分，如蛋白质、脂质、信使核糖核酸（mRNAs）、微小核糖核酸（microRNAs）、长链非编码核糖核酸、环状核糖核酸和双链脱氧核糖核酸（DNA），它们源自其脱落的细胞。其大小范围约为25至300纳米，通过运输信号分子在促进细胞间通讯中发挥关键作用。体液中小细胞外囊泡的发现及其在细胞间通讯中的作用，彻底改变了诊断、预后和治疗领域，尤其是在癌症等疾病方面。用于分离和分析小细胞外囊泡，特别是其核酸含量的传统方法面临诸多挑战，包括成本高、纯度低、过程耗时、标准化有限以及产量不一致。微流控设备的发展，能够使用少量样本在分选、分离和分子水平分离方面提高精度，并为增强与癌症相关的小细胞外囊泡的检测和监测提供了巨大潜力。鉴于这些先进技术具有成本效益高、操作简单等可能性，它们有望创造下一代诊断和预后工具。这篇综述探讨了用于检测作为生物标志物的小细胞外囊泡衍生核酸的微流控设备的研究现状，以及它们向实际即时检测和临床应用的转化。
