Our lab focuses on detecting circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA) and EV-associated DNA (EV-DNA) in human biofluids (liquid biopsy). Please visit it us at burnierlab.ca.
Studies have shown that extracellular vesicles (EVs) carry cancer biomarkers and can thus be used in liquid biopsy-based research. To date, research on EV-associated DNA (EV-DNA) in human biofluids under physiological and pathological conditions has generated a large amount of data spread across published literature. However, no database exists that catalogues this information.
To address this, we developed the EV-Associated DNA Database (EV-ADD) (evdnadatabase.com), which is a manually curated database of EV-DNA data providing information from peer reviewed and published papers. We include data on EV isolation methods, EV characterization, EV-DNA isolation techniques, DNA fragment size, volume of starting material, gene names, and disease types. Moreover, EV-ADD aims to serve as a learning tool and to showcase the latest developments in the EV-associated DNA field.
Although there are databases that report the presence of proteins, lipids, and mRNA found in EVs (Vesiclepedia, ExoCarta, etc.) to the best of our knowledge, EV-ADD is the first database of its kind.
Despite the controversy of whether exosomes carry DNA (luminal or on the surface), many studies have suggested the presence of dsDNA in EVs. We have thus compiled the data available in the literature to demonstrate EV-associated DNA in human biofluid samples (plasma, urine, pleural effusions, sweat and ascites).
At this point, data from 12 patients with disease and 9 healthy controls, 13 different types of EV isolation techniques from 6 human biofluids, mtDNA copies and EV-associated mutant copies of genes (KRAS, EGFR, BRAF), as well as whole genome from human biofluids have been added to EV-ADD.
We hope that this database will bring together researchers in the field who can help build this database with new publications. This resource can help to support users as they design new experiments and provide a summary of current data and methods related to EV-DNA isolation.
Thank you for visiting!
EV-ADD Team
evdnadatabase@gmail.com