Fig. 2

The expressional landscape of plasma EV RNAs in long-term and short-term PDAC survivors from the discovery cohort. A Negative-stain transmission electron microscopy (TEM) of extracellular vesicles (EVs) isolated from PDAC patients. Representative figures showed the heterogenity of EVs from plasma of PDAC patients. B Nanoparticle tracking analysis (NTA) for the concentration and size of the EVs from long-term and short-term PDAC survivors. C Western blot analysis of EV- and non-EV protein levels in the EVs isolated from PDAC patients. D Distribution of all EV RNAs based on the results from RNA sequencing of long-term and short-term PDAC patients. LincRNA: Long intervening noncoding RNA; mRNA: messenger RNA; miRNA: micro RNAs; rRNA: ribosomal RNA; pseudogene: non-functional segments of DNA. E Heatmap of differentially expressed EV mRNAs between long-term and short-term survivors. Each row represents an EV mRNA whereas each column denotes a patient sample. F Volcano plot displayed differentially expressed genes that were significantly upregulated (red dots) or down-regulated (blue dots) when compared with short-term survivors (adjusted p value < 0.05) and absolute Log2 fold-change > 1). G Gene Set Enrichment Analysis (GSEA) showed the differentially expressed EV mRNAs from the short-term survivors significantly enriched in the Hallmark pathways compared with the long-term survivors (adjusted p value < 0.05). MYC: Master regulator of cell cycle entry and proliferative metabolism; TGF Beta: Transforming growth factor beta 1; TNFα: Tumour necrosis factor alpha; NFκB: Nuclear factor kappa B