Market Overview:
This capillary-channeled polymer (C-CP) fiber technology is a cost efficient and highly selective method to isolate exosomes facilitating widespread use of these cellular fragments for biomarker research, medical diagnostics, and targeted delivery of therapeutics. Exosomes are lipid membrane-derived vesicles secreted by most types of cells, which hold promise for diagnosing disease, as they retain the biomarkers of their parent cell. By analyzing exosomes, the presence of diseased cells may be detected prior to clinical onset of chronic diseases. Currently available methods of exosome isolation, like differential centrifugation in which particles are separated from a solution based on their specific size, shape, and density, often compromise the structure of the vesicle and are also time-consuming and costly on a clinical scale. Clemson University researchers have developed a novel, high-yield, low-cost method for isolation and collection of these nano-entities that can be customized to isolate various types of exosomes.
Application Stage of Development
Diagnostics; Targeted Drug Delivery Clinical proof of concept (cervical cancer)
Advantages
• Efficient low cost method to collect exosomes compared to existing techniques
• Fibers can isolate both specific and generic exosomes, allowing for highly selective collection
• Method does not compromise the physical structure of targeted exosomes, enabling their use for medical
diagnostics and therapeutic drug delivery
Technical Summary
The use of polyethylene terephthalate (PET) capillary-channeled polymer (C-CP) fibers in a hydrophobic interaction chromatography (HIC) protocol has shown promise in efficiently and effectively isolating exosomes in laboratory settings, with scalable potential. The technology demonstrates the ability to collect nano-entities on a much faster time scale with comparable yields and size distributions compared to traditional methods of exosome isolation, including differential centrifugation and the ExoEasy Maxi kit (QIAGEN). The versatility of PET C-CP fibers allows surface modifications for exosome type-specific isolation, which would prove useful in medical diagnostics. The fibers provide opportunity for scalable separations, allowing for implementation in small, spin-down columns as well as on a preparative scale for bulk exosome isolation from bioreactors. Exosome isolation on such a large scale would enable their potential use as natural, biocompatible drug delivery vehicles.
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Inventor: Dr. R. Kenneth Marcus, Dr. Terri F. Bruce
Patent Type: Provisional
Serial Number: 62/626,398
CURF Ref No: 2018-006