Diana Romenskaja
Junior Researcher, Centre for Innovative Medicine, Lithuania
I have a bioengineering bachelor’s degree and medical biology master’s degree. Currently I am a junior researcher and a PhD student at Centre for Innovative Medicine. Since the beginning of my scientific journey, I have been working with microglial cells and extracellular vesicles isolated from oral mucosal stem cell supernatants. I focus on research of interplay between extracellular vesicles and autophagy, lipid raft formation processes in human microglial cells.
Novel insights into the molecular mechanisms underlying the effects of
extracellular vesicles on human microglial cells
Dysregulated microglial response is important for the development and propagation of neurological disorders and therefore targeting of neuroinflammatory microglia is considered as a novel therapeutic strategy. Extracellular vesicles (EVs) containing multiple proteins, RNAs, lipids and metabolites effectively suppress neuroinflammation and induce neuroprotective effects in different pathological conditions. Nevertheless, the mechanisms by which EVs regulate microglial responses remain largely unexplored. During my talk I will present our recent data about the effects of EVs derived from human oral mucosa stem cells on the migration, phagocytic activity, autophagy and inflammatory response of human microglial cells. I will also show that EVs interfere with Toll-like receptor 4 signaling, promote lipid raft formation and initiate downstream signaling pathways through milk fat globule-epidermal growth factor VIII (MFG-E8) – αVβ3/αVβ5 integrin – dependent mechanisms.
