EXIT - Exosomes Isolation Tool with nanofluidic concentration Device

At present there is no effective therapy to Alzheimer’s disease and the mechanism of the disease is not fully understood. Recently, exosomes – nanosize membrane vesicles that are present in all bodily fluids – have been shown to play an important role in the remote communication between cells and to be able to pass the blood-brain barrier.

EXIT aims to develop a state-ofthe- art, nanotechnologically driven, analytical platform for the isolation of exosomes from bodily fluids, designed to investigate metabolic, proteomic, immunologic and transcriptional changes in Alzheimer’s disease. The basis of this platform is a novel electro-driven separation and concentration method.

EXIT will integrate nanotechnology,  transcriptomics, genetics and metabolomics with large existing EU biobanks, enabling the investigation of large sample cohorts of paired cerebrospinal fluid and blood. Within EXIT nanotechnologists, analytical chemists, biologists, geneticists, epidemiologists and clinicians will work together to make the longawaited breakthrough in exosome isolation and rapidly translate this breakthrough into etiologic, preventive and therapeutic applications.

This translational research project "EXIT - Exosome Isolation Tool with Nanofluidic Concentration Device" translates the technological advances in the area of nanotechnology and nanoparticle separation for a highly relevant early clinical diagnosis and prognostic application for Alzheimer's disease (AD). These techniques will benefit the health and safety of patients and public health services and will support the development of new treatments and prevention strategies.

EXIT aims to generate knowledge in terms of:

1) Clinical care: Currently, the cerebrospinal fluid test is informative for early diagnosis in the mild cognitive impairment (MCI) phase and cannot be used in people without any symptoms.

2) Etiological research: validating vascular and cellular metabolic profiles that are related to dementia would have a great impact on clinical and epidemiological research.

3) Therapeutic research: there is a growing awareness that effective cure of AD is only possible in those people with early pathology, in whom neuronal death is limited. Therefore, it would be essential to have risk profiles that can be diagnosed in blood.

4) Society: Dementia not only has a great impact on patients, their families and caregivers, but also on society due to the enormous increase in the need for long-term care and home services.