SoylentNews

Phoenix666 writes:

For decades scientists thought that very tiny bubbles released by some human cells were nothing more than biological debris. But a new study with roundworms suggests otherwise.

The bubbles, known as extracellular vesicles (EVs), can have beneficial health effects, like promoting tissue repair, or play a diabolical role and carry disease signals for cancer or neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer's.

Researchers isolated and profiled cells releasing EVs in adult C. elegans and identified 335 genes that provide significant information about the biology of EVs and their relationship to human diseases.

They found that 10 percent of the 335 identified genes in the roundworm regulate the formation, release, and possible function of the EVs. Understanding how EVs are made, dispersed and communicate with other cells can shed light on the difference between EVs carrying sickness or health.

"These EV's are exciting but scary because we don't know what the mechanisms are that decide what is packaged inside them," says Maureen Barr, lead author and a professor in the genetics department at Rutgers University. "It's like getting a letter in the mail and you don't know whether it's a letter saying that you won the lottery or a letter containing anthrax."

Original study

Original Submission