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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2020 Aug 13.
Published in final edited form as: Adv Drug Deliv Rev. 2019 Aug 13;144:90–111. doi: 10.1016/j.addr.2019.08.004

Fig. 5.

Fig. 5.

Harnessing exosomes for drug delivery.

(A) Exosomes are considered to have great potential as drug delivery systems due to their biocompatibility, cargo protection, long circulation time, and targetability to specific cells/tissues. Also, the lipid membrane of exosomes allows for loading hydrophobic and hydrophilic drugs in the interlayer and core compartments, respectively. Redrawn from [327]. (B) Cargo packaging in exosomes for drug delivery. (i) Incubation of exosomes with cargos allows for the encapsulation of cargos in the exosomes. (ii) Sonication destabilizes the membrane of exosomes, which leads to the influx of cargos. (iii) Extrusion of exosomes with cargos causes physical breakages of the membrane, resulting to the encapsulation of cargos. (iv) Transfection of parental cells with a gene of interest can introduce the generation of the exosomes containing cargos. (v) Electroporation transiently increases the permeability of exosomal membrane so that genetic cargos can be incorporated.