Isolation and characterization of urinary extracellular vesicles: implications for biomarker discovery

Urinary extracellular vesicles comprise a wide range of biologically distinct structures with contents that are a snapshot of the life of a cellUrine is a dynamic biofluid, which changes over hours and days within an individual; therefore, at present, no single approach for the isolation of urinary extracellular vesicles is likely to comprehensively distinguish between healthy and disease statesAlterations in the composition of urinary extracellular vesicles are useful experimentally and may provide information about disease pathophysiology as well as provide diagnostic end points for the study of renal diseasePerhaps the greatest promise of this 'extracellular organelle' is to open a window for science into a greater understanding of cellular therapeutics