The present invention relates to the development of vesicles that could be used for the production of vaccines or as compound delivery vehicles. More specifically, the present invention relates to a method for preparing vesicles comprising the steps of providing recombinant
Trypanosoma brucei cells expressing a sortagable VSG, treating said cells in a hypotonic solution in the presence of at least one
protease inhibitor until the cells are lysed, isolating
cell membranes from the solution, suspending the isolated membranes already obtained in an isotonic solution, treating the suspended
cell membranes obtained in the preceding step with
sonication to obtain a
vesicle suspension, removing aggregated membranous debris from the
vesicle suspension already obtained, separating the
vesicle suspension into a
population of vesicles, and providing a vesicle from the
population of vesicles characterized by the following parameters: (i) having a single predominant
protein, revealed after Coomassie
staining of SDS-PAGE, with an apparent molecular weight of 55-60 kDa, (ii) having a spherical appearance in
electron micrographs, and (iii) showing a homogenous
surface structure in
electron micrographs. Furthermore, the present invention also relates to vesicles comprising sortagable VSG characterized by the above-mentioned parameters and to such vesicles for use in the treatment and / or prevention of a
disease or medical condition or as a compound delivery vesicle, preferably a
drug delivery vehicle, more preferably a
nucleic acid delivery vesicle.Finally, the present invention contemplates a kit for performing the method of the present invention, comprising recombinant
Trypanosoma brucei cells expressing a sortagable VSG and at least one agent for performing the method of the present invention or a kit comprising a vesicle of the present invention.