Figure 1.
Extracellular vesicle release and contents. Microvesicles bud directly from the plasma membrane. Exosomes, formed by inward budding of late endosomes, are held in multivesicular bodies (MVB) within the cell. Fusion of the MVBs with the cell membrane releases the exosomes into the extracellular space. Microvesicles and exosomes contain a diverse array of cargo, including lipids, transmembrane and globular proteins, DNA, mRNA, and microRNA. All represented membranes are phospholipid bilayers.