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Melanoma exosomes: messengers of metastasis

Nature Medicine volume 18, pages 853–854 (2012)Cite this article

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A new study shows that melanoma-derived exosomes contribute to metastatic invasion by carrying messenger proteins that direct bone marrow–derived cells toward a prometastatic phenotype. This leads to the promotion of proangiogenic events and modification of the extracellular matrix at premetastatic sites (pages 883–891).

Malignant melanoma is an aggressive form of skin cancer whose incidence continues to increase worldwide. Although a large number of primary melanomas can be cured through surgery, treatment of metastatic melanomas remains challenging1. In most cases, melanoma begins with the transformation of a benign nevus that develops into dysplastic lesions before progressing into a primary melanoma that can invade into the dermis and regional lymph nodes and from there disseminate to distant metastatic sites1.

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Figure 1: Melanoma-derived exosomes are messengers for angiogenesis and metastatic invasion.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Rajasekharan Somasundaram and Meenhard Herlyn are in the Tumor Microenvironment and Metastasis Program, Melanoma Research Center, The Wistar Institute, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA.,

    Rajasekharan Somasundaram & Meenhard Herlyn

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  1. Rajasekharan Somasundaram
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  2. Meenhard Herlyn
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Correspondence to Meenhard Herlyn.

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The authors declare no competing financial interests.

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Somasundaram, R., Herlyn, M. Melanoma exosomes: messengers of metastasis. Nat Med 18, 853–854 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1038/nm.2775

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