Journal of Extracellular Vesicles (Dec 2018)

Ultrafiltration and size exclusion chromatography combined with asymmetrical-flow field-flow fractionation for the isolation and characterisation of extracellular vesicles from urine

  • Eline Oeyen,
  • Kurt Van Mol,
  • Geert Baggerman,
  • Hanny Willems,
  • Kurt Boonen,
  • Christian Rolfo,
  • Patrick Pauwels,
  • An Jacobs,
  • Karin Schildermans,
  • William C Cho,
  • Inge Mertens

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1080/20013078.2018.1490143
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 7, no. 1

Abstract

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Extracellular vesicles (EVs) have a great potential in clinical applications. However, their isolation from different bodily fluids and their characterisation are currently not optimal or standardised. Here, we report the results of examining the performance of ultrafiltration combined with size exclusion chromatography (UF-SEC) to isolate EVs from urine. The results reveal that UF-SEC is an efficient method and provides high purity. Furthermore, we introduce asymmetrical-flow field-flow fractionation coupled with a UV detector and multi-angle light-scattering detector (AF4/UV-MALS) as a characterisation method and compare it with current methods. We demonstrate that AF4/UV-MALS is a straightforward and reproducible method for determining size, amount and purity of isolated urinary EVs.

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