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Detecting pancreatic duct adenocarcinoma (PDAC) in its early stages and predicting late‐stage patient prognosis undergoing chemotherapy is challenging. This work shows that the activation of specific oncogenes leads to elevated expression of mRNAs and their corresponding proteins in extracellular vesicles (EVs) circulating in blood. Utilizing an immune lipoplex nanoparticle (ILN) biochip assay, these findings demonstrate that glypican 1 (GPC1) mRNA expression in the exosomes‐rich (Exo) EV subpopulation and GPC1 membrane protein (mProtein) expression in the microvesicles‐rich (MV) EV subpopulation, particularly the tumor associated microvesicles (tMV), served as a viable biomarker for PDAC. A combined analysis effectively discriminated early‐stage PDAC patients from benign pancreatic diseases and healthy donors in sizable clinical from multiple hospitals. Furthermore, among late‐stage PDAC patients undergoing chemotherapy, lower GPC1 tMV‐mProtein and Exo‐mRNA expression before treatment correlated significantly with prolonged overall survival. These findings underscore the potential of vesicular GPC1 expression for early PDAC screenings and chemotherapy prognosis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Proteins and enzymes can be encapsulated in nanoporous gels to develop novel technologies for biosensing, biocatalysis, and biosynthesis. When encapsulated, certain macromolecules retain high levels of activity and functionality and are more resistant to denaturation when exposed to extremes of pH and temperature. We have utilized intrinsic fluorescence and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy to determine the structural transitions of encapsulated lysozyme in the range of -120 [degrees] C < T < 100[degrees] C. At cryogenic temperatures encapsulated lysozyme did not show cold denaturation, instead became more structured. However, at high temperatures, the onset of heat denaturation of confined lysozyme was reduced by 15[degrees]C when compared with lysozyme in solution. Altered dynamics of the solvent and pore size distribution of the nanopores in the matrix appear to be key factors influencing the decrease in the denaturation temperature. [DOI: 10.1115/1.3171565]

Large-scale microparticle arrays (LSMA) are key for material science and bioengineering applications. However, previous approaches suffer from tradeoffs between scalability, precision, specificity, and versatility. Here, we present a porous microwell-based approach to create large-scale microparticle arrays with complex motifs. Microparticles are guided to and pushed into microwells by fluid flow through small open pores at the bottom of the porous well arrays. A scaling theory allows for the rational design of LSMAs to sort and array particles based on their size, shape or modulus. Sequential particle assembly allows for proximal and nested particle arrangements, as well as particle recollection and pattern transfer. We demonstrate the capabilities of the approach by means of three applications: high-throughput single-cell arrays; microenvironment fabrication for neutrophil chemotaxis; and complex, covert tags by the transfer of an upconversion nanocrystal laden LSMA.

Surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) is a powerful tool that provides valuable insight into the molecular contents of chemical and biological samples. However, interpreting Raman spectra from complex or dynamic datasets remains challenging, particularly for highly heterogeneous biological samples like extracellular vesicles (EVs). To overcome this, we developed a tunable and interpretable deep autoencoder for the analysis of several challenging Raman spectroscopy applications, including synthetic datasets, chemical mixtures, a chemical milling reaction, and mixtures of EVs. We compared the results with classical methods (PCA and UMAP) to demonstrate the superior performance of the proposed technique. Our method can handle small datasets, provide a high degree of generalization such that it can fill unknown gaps within spectral datasets, and even quantify relative ratios of cell line-derived EVs to fetal bovine serum-derived EVs within mixtures. This simple yet robust approach will greatly improve the analysis capabilities for many other Raman spectroscopy applications., Competing Interests: There are no conflicts to declare., (© 2024 Optica Publishing Group.)