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COVER STORY: ASHLAND Exoblossom™
The cosmetics industry is undergoing a significant shift towards a more demanding beauty, driven by the increasing demand for high-performance, science-backed ingredients. Among the most promising advances are extracellular vesicles, and in particular exosomes, which have emerged as powerful mediators of intercellular communication.
October 2025 INGREDIENTS ●
From regenerative medicine to cosmetics, exosome science is blooming Once primarily investigated in the field of regenerative medicine, exosomes are now gaining considerable attention in cosmetic science for their ability to deliver bioactive molecules and modulate cellular functions in the skin. Exosomes are nanoscale vesicles (30-
150nm) naturally secreted by virtually all kinds of cells, both in animal and plant systems. Exosomes carry a complex cargo of proteins, lipids, nucleic acids, and signaling molecules that enable them to influence diverse biological pathways. In the context of dermatology, exosomes derived from human cell cultures have demonstrated potential to stimulate central mechanisms for skin regeneration and age prevention.
Flower-derived exosome science, a natural interest for Ashland While their interest in cosmetic science is rising, plant-derived exosomes remain largely underexplored due to technical challenges in their extraction, purification, characterization, and biological evaluation. Building on decades of experience in
developing advanced botanical extracts for the cosmetic industry, Ashland has developed robust capabilities for the isolation and molecular characterization of exosome-like nanoparticles from selected plant species, preserving their native integrity and bioactive potential.
Plant-derived exosome-like nanoparticles: a new field of investigation Plants secrete various elements to communicate from cell to cell including extracellular vesicles. Among them belong the plant-derived exosomes which share similar structures and function with mammalian-derived exosomes.1 Driven by our solid expertise in plant
extraction technologies, Ashland studied the content of various plant extracts, particularly floral extracts, with the aim of gathering evidence demonstrating that they contain vesicles that share the characteristics of exosomes, which we will refer to as plant-
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derived exosome-like nanoparticles (PELNs).
Extraction and purification Extraction/purification is the first necessary step, but existing methods are imperfect and not fully validated. So, Ashland solvers developed an internal protocol using the polymer precipitation method, with encouraging results. Simultaneously, we established fruitful
partnerships with local university laboratories that have specialized devices. Through these collaborations, we descended further. Together, we have improved and optimized protocols. One of the first improvements was gaining access to ultracentrifugation equipment through the IMPC (Institute of Molecular and Cellular Pharmacology). Ultracentrifugation is the most widely described isolation method, and it enables us to achieve a visible improvement in the purification of PELNs.
flower-released exosomes PERSONAL CARE
: harnessing GLOBAL FORMULATION ● MANUFACTURE
Visualization After isolation, the essential prerequisite for referencing PELNs is their morphological identification using ultrastructural structure detection methods, the most common and widely recognized method being transmission electron microscopy (TEM). The visualization of our plant-derived
vesicles by TEM was carried out with the support of the CCMA (Joint Center for Applied Microscopy) at the University of Côte d’Azur, with qualitative results as illustrated below.
Characterization & quantification “But visualization alone is not enough; it is essential to distinguish PELNs from other vesicles,” insists Laurine Bergeron, R&D Project Manager. Exosomes are characterized by the presence of specific membrane constituents that are determined by their origin and crucial for their targeting and biological activity. “Membrane marker protein detection is
well described for human-derived exosome- like nanovesicles, but this research field is still immature when it comes to PELNs. A more accessible alternative is membrane lipid marking, a method we quickly developed in-house to proceed in the quantification stages,” she added. Quantification of lipid membrane labelled
vesicles in various flower extracts was carried out by Fluorescence Activated Cell Sorting (FACS), particle size distribution and concentration were also provided using the Nanoparticle Tracking Analysis (NTA). Both experiments were performed at the IMPC.
Comprehensive exploration goes on with ‘omics’ studies To go further in characterization of PELNs, protein analysis seems essential to obtain relevant and comprehensive data on membrane proteins, as well as on intravesicular content. First, we performed internal analyses using western blotting with specific protein markers known to be expressed in plant exosomes-like such as classes of tetraspanins.2 We are continuing with a proteomic study with the support of the IMPC. A literature review enabled us to identify a relevant protein database, determine the correspondence with the plants studied, and add sequences related to human and plant exosome protein markers.3,4 Ultimately, this proteomic analysis will be
completed with investigations on PELNs cargo with lipidomic, transcriptomic studies and secondary metabolites analysis.
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