Plasma-derived Extracellular Vesicles (EVs) as Biomarkers of Sepsis in Burn Patients via Label-free Raman Spectroscopy

Abstract

Sepsis following burn trauma is a global complication with high mortality, with ~60% of burn patient deaths resulting from infectious complications. Sepsis diagnosis is complicated by confounding clinical manifestations of the burn injury, and current biomarkers markers lack the sensitivity and specificity required for prompt treatment. Circulating extracellular vesicles (EVs) from patient liquid biopsy as biomarkers of sepsis due to their release by pathogens from bacterial biofilms and roles in subsequent immune response. This study applies Raman spectroscopy to patient plasma derived EVs for rapid, sensitive, and specific detection of sepsis in burn patients, achieving 97.5% sensitivity and 90.0% specificity. Furthermore, spectral differences between septic and non-septic burn patient EVs could be traced to specific glycoconjugates of bacterial strains associated with sepsis morbidity. This work illustrates the potential application of EVs as biomarkers in clinical burn trauma care, and establishes Raman analysis as a fast, label-free method to specifically identify features of bacterial EVs relevant to infection amongst the host background.