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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2019 Jan 9.
Published in final edited form as: Circulation. 2018 Jan 9;137(2):212. doi: 10.1161/CIRCULATIONAHA.117.031555

Exosomal microRNA Transfer into Macrophages Mediates Cellular Postconditioning

Eduardo Marbán 1, Geoffrey de Couto 1
PMCID: PMC5765870  NIHMSID: NIHMS924032  PMID: 29311354

To the editor

Chen and Shen point out that exosomes from mesenchymal stem cells (MSCexo) have certain cardioprotective properties. They then speculate that MSCexo might resemble exosomes from cardiosphere-derived cells (CDCexo) in their bioactivity on macrophages1. No data are available on the effects of MSCexo on macrophages. The literature does, however, provide several reasons to believe that the two cell types, and their exosomes, are not synonymous. RNA sequencing of MSCexo and CDCexo has revealed that they contain quite different RNA cargoes: CDCexo had a greater overall abundance of Y RNA fragments, and miR content was distinct (four miRNAs [miR-146a, miR-151, miR-409, miR-423] were highly enriched in CDCexo, while miR-10a and miR-4792 were more abundant in MSCexo)2. The parent MSCs and CDCs also exhibit notable differences. MSCs express high levels of CD903, a fibroblast-associated antigen, while CDCs do not4. Moreover, a head-to-head comparison of therapeutic efficacy in a murine myocardial infarction model revealed superior structural and functional benefits with human CDCs relative to human MSCs5.

Footnotes

Disclosures Statement

Dr. Marbán owns founder’s equity in and serves as an unpaid advisor to Capricor Inc. Dr. de Couto is a paid consultant for Capricor.

References

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