Exosome tracers: Cyto-Tracers

The exosome Cyto-Tracers from System Biosciences are lentivector-based constructs and pre-packaged viral particles to label organelles with GFP and RFP, enabling the visualisation of cellular structures in vivo and in vitro in real-time by fluorescence. These vectors can be used directly in transfection or packaged into lentiviral particles for the generation of stable tracer cell lines as well as labelling exosomes from primary cells and stem cells.

Benefits of using these exosome tracers
• Stable lentivector-based system
• Ideal for co-localisation studies
• Monitor exosome dynamics & functional studies in real time
• Label exosomes from primary cells, tumour cells, stem cells, and more

Exosome transfer from CMs to ECs
The following figures are from publication: Garcia, N.A., Ontoria-Oviedo, I., González-King, H., Diez-Juan, A. and Sepúlveda, P. (2015). Glucose Starvation in Cardiomyocytes Enhances Exosome Secretion and Promotes Angiogenesis in Endothelial Cells. PLoS ONE, [online] 10(9). Available at: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4578916/#pone.0138849.s003 [Accessed 20 Feb. 2020].

(A) H9c2 transfected with pCT-CD63-GFP. FACS analysis of 90% GFP positive cells. (B) Representative images from confocal time-lapse microscopy of mouse ECs (ACTB-DsRed) (EC; red) co-cultured with H9C2-CD63-GFP cells (green), previously cultured for 24 h in +/-St medium. Exosome transfer from H9C2 CMs to EC can be observed (S1 and S2 Movies, below). White arrows show CD63-GFP structures inside ECs (C) Representative immunostaining of H9C2-CD63-GFP and HUVEC co-cultures; anti-GFP (green) and anti-CD31 (red). The images illustrate GFP fluorescence from CD63-GFP exosomes in CD31-positive cells (red) after 24 h incubation in +/-St medium. White arrows show CD63-GFP structures inside ECs.

Material available for download
Cyto-Tracer Vectors user manual
Lentivirus safety guidelines