Extracellular Vesicles from Inflammation-Primed Adipose-Derived Stem Cells Enhance Achilles Tendon Repair by Reducing Inflammation and Promoting Intrinsic Healing.

Evidence from laboratory and animal studies provides groundwork for understanding mechanisms and potential before human studies continue.

• Level A · Stronger Clinical Evidence
• Level B · Emerging clinical evidence with positive signals
• Level C · Early human research exploring benefits
• Level D · Scientific groundwork from lab and animal studies
• Emerging · Emerging topic under active research

Abstract (original English)

Achilles tendon rupture is a common sports-related tendon injury. Even with advanced clinical treatments, many patients suffer from long-term pain and reduced function. These unsatisfactory outcomes result primarily from an imbalanced injury response with excessive inflammation and inadequate regeneration. Prior studies showed that extracellular vesicles from inflammation-primed adipose-derived stem cells (iEVs) can attenuate inflammation in the early phase of tendon healing. However, the effect of iEVs on tendon inflammation and regeneration in the later phases of tendon healing and the underlying mechanism remain to be determined. Accordingly, this study investigated the mechanistic roles of iEVs in regulating tendon response to injury using a mouse Achilles tendon injury and repair model in vivo and iEV-macrophage and iEV-tendon cell co-culture models in vitro. Results showed that iEVs promoted tendon anti-inflammatory gene expression and reduced mononuclear cell infiltration in the remodeling phase of tendon healing. iEVs also increased injury site collagen deposition and promoted tendon structural recovery. As such, mice treated with iEVs showed less peritendinous scar formation, much lower incidence of postoperative tendon gap or rupture, and faster functional recovery compared to untreated mice. Further in vitro study revealed that iEVs both inhibited macrophage inflamma

Evidence level

Evidence from laboratory and animal studies provides groundwork for understanding mechanisms and potential before human studies continue.

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