Tab. 1

Clinical characteristics of participants"

Fig. 1

Quality evaluation of the extracted plasma exosomes A: The tracking analysis of nanoparticles showed that the size of the extracted exosomes was 40-150 nm, and the peak of particle size distribution was about 72.25 nm; B: The size and structure of exosomes observed by the transmission electron microscope; C: The expression levels of FLOT1 and CD63 protein in the enriched exosomes determined by Western blot. The upper numbers represent the fraction number of the size exclusion chromatography (fraction 1-6 is the void volumes), and the numbers on the right indicate the molecular weights of the corresponding proteins."

Fig. 2

Comparison of plasma exosomal proteins with the ExoCarta and Vesiclepedia databases A: Inter-sample normalization of the plasma exosomal protein expression data; B: The plasma exosomal proteins ranked according to their abundance; C: Comparison Venn diagram of plasma exosomal proteins between the HCC group and HC group; D: Comparison Venn diagram of plasma exosomal protein between those identified in this study and those annotated in the ExoCarta and Vesiclepedia databases."

Fig. 3

Identification of HCC-associated proteins based on plasma exosomal proteomes in the discovery cohort A: Principal component analysis based on plasma exosomal proteomes; B: Comparison Venn diagram of high-quality proteins between in the HCC group and HC group; C: Volcano plot of differentially expressed proteins between the HCC group and HC group; D: Box plot of CD48 expression levels in the HCC group and HC group."

Fig. 4

Evaluation of the detection effect of self-built ELISA method A: Detection of CD48 in the extracted exosomes by immunofluorescence staining; B: A schematic diagram of the self-made ELISA methods for detection of CD48 protein in plasma exosomes; C: The standard curve of the ELISA method 1 in the exosomes extracted from plasma; D: The standard curve of the ELISA method 1 in the plasma; E: The correlation between the CD48 levels in extracted exosomes and plasma detected by the ELISA method 1; F: The standard curve of the ELISA method 2 in the purified CD48 proteins; G: The ELISA method 1 was used to detect the expression levels of plasma exosomal CD48 protein in the clinical samples from the validation cohort; H: The ELISA method 2 was used to detect the expression levels of plasma CD48 protein in the clinical samples from the validation cohort."

Fig. 5

Performance of plasma exosomal CD48 for HCC diagnosis A: Expression levels of plasma exosomal CD48 protein in each group of the validation cohort; B: Expression levels of plasma AFP in each group of the validation cohort; C: ROC curves of the plasma exosomal CD48 and plasma AFP alone or their combination for distinguishing the patients with HCC from controls (patients with LC and HC)."

Tab. 2

The performance of plasma AFP and plasma exosomal CD48 alone or their combination for HCC diagnosis"

Tab. 3

Relationship between plasma exosomal CD48 levels and clinicopathological parameters of patients with HCC"