Extracellular vesicles: small bricks for tissue repair/regeneration

Extracellular vesicles (EVs) are nano-sized membrane vesicles involved in intercellular communication. EVs have pleiotropic actions in physiological and pathological conditions. The ability of EVs to transports proteins, drugs and nucleic acid, to target specific cells and to increase the stability of therapeutic cargo, make EVs interesting as new devices for the treatment of human disease. In a recently published issue of European journal of pharmaceutical sciences, Silva and colleagues reviewed the ability of EVs to modulate tissue repair and regeneration, focusing on their roles and therapeutic potential as immunomodulatory messengers. In this perspective, we discussed the open questions regarding the dual role of EVs in immune system, as well as the technical limitation of the procedure for EVs isolation and administration in clinical practices. EV-based therapies require further studies to consider EVs as promising candidate for a novel cell-free therapy in the context of regeneration medicine.