The Role of Red Blood Cell-Derived Extracellular Vesicles in Drug Delivery
A special issue of International Journal of Molecular Sciences (ISSN 1422-0067). This special issue belongs to the section "Molecular Biology".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 31 May 2025 | Viewed by 55
Special Issue Editors
Interests: red blood cells; extracellular vesicles; drug delivery systems; RNA therapies; EV engineering
Interests: exosomes; intercellular communication; gene expression; DNA damage; cell–cell communication; cell signaling; cancer; cell biology; extracellular vesicles; membrane trafficking; mitochondria function and diseases; oxidative stress and antioxidants; molecular adaptations to physical activity
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
We are thrilled to announce that we are opening a Special Issue titled “The Role of Red Blood Cell-Derived Extracellular Vesicles in Drug Delivery”.
The recent advent of biologics needs increasingly sophisticated and specific delivery systems to target recipient cells and deliver the active pharmaceutical ingredients inside them. EVs are the most promising tools because they can reach all the body compartments, protect cargo during their journey, and release cargo inside the destination cell. However, their clinical exploitation is minimal because some problems still need to be solved.
Within this scenario, RBCs are one of the most interesting sources for EV production because they are easily obtainable in large quantities from healthy donors or the same patient. Moreover, they have been proposed as drug delivery systems for more than 50 years, as they are completely safe, biocompatible, non-immunogenic, and do not contain DNA, thus avoiding horizontal gene transfer.
This Special Issue will focus on Red Blood Cell-derived Extracellular Vesicles (RBCEVs) loaded with therapeutic cargoes for medical purposes, EV engineering, and translational medicine. Thanks to all of you, we want to answer some specific questions: Can we use RBCEVs for delivery of drugs or biologics? Are they easily translatable to the clinics?
Suitable topics include, but are not limited to:
- Methods for production of RBCEV mimetics or artificial cell-derived vesicles (ACDVs) obtained from RBCs;
- Methods for cargo loading (e.g., endogenous and exogenous loading, passive and active);
- Methods for surface functionalisation;
- In vitro and/or preclinical applications of RBCEVs;
- Delivery of biologics by RBCEVs with a special focus on RNA delivery.
Dr. Sara Biagiotti
Prof. Michele Guescini
Guest Editors
Manuscript Submission Information
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Keywords
- red blood cells
- red blood cell-extracellular vesicles
- drug delivery systems
- RNA therapies
- EV engineering
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