Extracellular vesicles (EVs) are double-membrane vesicles in the size range of 30 nm to a few microns that are released from myriad cell types and are present in a variety of biofluids. These small entities are studied for biomarker development, cell communication, and targeted delivery. Rapid advances in EV research have generated a great demand for fast, robust, and reproducible EV isolation methods. Ultracentrifugation has been a commonly used isolation technique, but increasing revelations have shown the limitations and flaws of the approach, leading to the recent popularization of chromatography-based methods.
Size exclusion chromatography (SEC) is a classical technique used to separate molecules based on size, eluting the largest first and smallest last. In classical SEC, porous beads are well-packed into a long column for the separation of molecules. The sample is segregated into fractions, where EVs are separated from biomolecules of other sizes that elute in different fractions. The ...
