{"doi":"10.1111/nmo.14257","title":"Neuronal‐enriched extracellular vesicles in individuals with IBS: A pilot study of COMT and BDNF","abstract":"BACKGROUND: Irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) is characterized by abdominal pain, bowel habit alterations, and psychiatric comorbidities. Although pathophysiology remains incompletely understood, prior work demonstrates associations with brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) and catechol-O-methyltransferase (COMT). The purpose of this study was to quantify BDNF and COMT in plasma and in neuronal-enriched extracellular vesicles (nEVs), assess relationships with psychological symptoms, and gain insight on the brain-gut connection in IBS. METHODS: Clinical data and biorepository samples from a parent investigation were used, including scores on the Perceived Stress Scale (PSS) and Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression Scale (CES-D). Distinct subpopulations of nEVs were isolated using neural cell adhesion molecule L1CAM; levels of COMT, mature BDNF, and pro-BDNF were quantified in plasma and in nEVs using ELISA. KEY RESULTS: Data from 47 females (28.11 ± 6.85 years) included 18 IBS and 29 healthy control (HC) participants. IBS participants displayed reduced plasma levels of mature BDNF compared with HC (p = 0.024). Levels of COMT plasma and IBS grouping significantly predicted CES-D scores (p = 0.034). Exploratory analyses by IBS subtype and race revealed African American HC display lower levels of COMT EV than Caucasian HC (p = 0.022). CONCLUSIONS & INFERENCES: Lower levels of mature BDNF in IBS participants, preliminary patterns detected in cargo content of nEVs, and relevance of COMT and IBS status to CES-D scores, offer insight on depressive symptomatology and brain-gut dysregulation in IBS. Lower COMT levels in nEVs of African Americans highlight the relevance of race when conducting such analyses across diverse populations.","journal":"Neurogastroenterology & Motility","year":2021,"id":181452,"datarank":0.0,"base_score":0.0,"endowment":0.0,"self_citation_contribution":0.0,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.0,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":16,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.957,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2021-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":304883,"name":"Maja Mustapić","orcid":"0000-0003-0511-2047","position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":256661,"name":"Dimitrios Kapogiannis","orcid":"0000-0003-2181-3118","position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":227806,"name":"Wendy A. Henderson","orcid":"0000-0003-3924-7118","position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":443294,"name":"Kristen R. Weaver","orcid":"0000-0002-8757-8758","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":64,"raw_metadata":null,"created_at":"2026-07-18T23:48:05.146883Z","pmid":"34499398","pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}