Abstract Preeclampsia is a life-threatening pregnancy complication, resulting in greater than 70,000 maternal deaths and over 500,000 fetal and neonatal deaths worldwide each year. Despite its prevalence and devastating consequences, there is still no medical therapy to halt disease progression and thus a vital need for novel treatments remains. The urgent demand for effective therapies for preeclampsia first necessitates a deeper understanding of the pathogenesis that underpins the condition. Understanding the coordinated interactions between the maternal vasculature and circulating pathogenic factors released from the placenta is a key focus in preeclampsia research. Extracellular vesicles are membrane-bound vesicles that act as essential mediators of cell-cell signalling. Extracellular vesicles are proposed to play a crucial role as regulators in placental-maternal vascular communication. This review explores contemporary literature investigating the role of placental-derived extracellular vesicles and their contribution to preeclampsia. Importantly, we provide a summary of key literature that should assist decision making for selection of models to study the role of extracellular vesicles in preeclampsia progression and their potential as therapeutic targets.
Fato et al. (Tue,) studied this question.