Researchers from the University of Ottawa and The Ottawa Hospital have found an 18-digit code (Wnt7a) that proteins can use to bind to exosomes, which are tiny, pinched-off fragments of cells that move throughout the body and transmit biochemical information. The finding, which was reported in Science Advances, has significant ramifications for the emerging field of exosome treatment, which aims to use exosomes to transport medications for a range of illnesses.
According to Dr. Michael Rudnicki, senior author of the study, director of the Regenerative Medicine Program at The Ottawa Hospital, and professor at the University of Ottawa, “Proteins are the body’s own home-made drugs, but they don’t necessarily travel well around the body.”
“We can now use exosomes to transport any protein throughout the body thanks to this finding. It provides access to an entirely new area of medication development.
Dr. Rudnicki and his colleagues found that a protein called Wnt7a, which is essential for development, growth, regeneration, and cancer, contains an exosome-targeting postal code or zip code. They first demonstrated Wnt7a’s ability to bind to exosomes. They next eliminated several regions of the Wnt7a protein until they identified the shortest region that was in charge of exosome-targeting.
This 18-amino acid component was dubbed the Exosome Binding Peptide (EBP). They then found that EBP could be used to target any protein to exosomes and that it interacts to proteins on exosomes known as coatomers.
First author Dr. Uxia Gurriaran-Rodriguez, a former postdoctoral fellow in Dr. Michael Rudnicki’s group who is currently employed at the Center for Cooperative Research in Biosciences (CIC bioGUNE) in Spain, stated, “Researchers have been trying for years to turn Wnt7a into a muscle regeneration drug, but it is very difficult to deliver Wnt7a throughout the body, since it is covered in fatty molecules that don’t mix well with body fluid.”
“Now that we know how Wnt7a attaches to exosomes, we have solved this problem and can now accelerate the development of drugs for devastating diseases such as Duchenne muscular dystrophy.”
Source: https://www.ohri.ca/newsroom/story/view/1742?l=en
Research: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.ado5914
