Wrap-up

The Joint Annual Meeting of the Austrian and Czech Society for Extracellular Vesicles #ASEVCzeSEV2024 opened in with a question: "Why are we here?" posed by ASEV President Wolfgang Holnthoner and CzeSEV President Vendula Pospíchalová. #ASEVCzeSEV2024 provided an exceptional platform for EV researchers from Austria, the Czech Republic, and beyond to network, exchange knowledge, and inspire new collaborations. #ASEVCzeSEV2024 brought together scientists from across the globe, including India, United Sates of America (USA), South Africa, Iceland, and Australia, while also offering the opportunity to reconnect with colleagues from Europe, the presidents of Serbian Society for Extracellular Vesicles Maja Kosanović, the president of the Baltic Society of Extracellular Vesicles, #AlirezaFazeli, and Kerstin Menck from the German Society for Extracellular Vesicles. We extend our sincere thanks to all early-career and senior researchers for their insightful talks and poster presentations, which will significantly contribute to advancing EV research.

A special thanks to Reinhard Gruber from the Austrian Cluster for Tissue Regeneration, who served as our local host at the University Clinic of Dentistry- Medical University of Vienna and played an essential role in the #ASEVCzeSEV2024 success. Acknowledgment also goes to the dedicated team from onesetting communication agency, Ronald Janisch and Benjamin Vigl, for their seamless technical support, which enabled a hybrid format for registered participants, ensuring full accessibility.

A massive thank you to the keynote speakers: Prof. Marca Wauben, for her insightful talk on milk EVs can enhance epithelial barrier function and dampen immune response; Prof. Carlos Salomon, for his presentation about as EVs can serve as diagnostic for early detection of ovarian cancer; Prof. Samir El Andaloussi, for his compelling talk on the therapeutic effect of engineered EVs in a melanoma cancer animal model; and Prof. Alireza Fazeli, for his exploration of how EVs influence endometrial cell transcriptomes. We are grateful to our keynotes that attended despite severe weather conditions across Europe, with special thanks to Prof. El Andaloussi for joining us online.

We also express our immense gratitude to our PLATINUM sponsors, Beckman Coulter Life Sciences and EVscale (Evercyte GmbH, Phoenestra GmbH, TAmiRNA GmbH), as well as our GOLD sponsors (Cytek Biosciences, ONI, Eppendorf, Particle Metrix GmbH, Unchained Labs, Quanterix, Sartorius, and Bartelt GmbH). Their generous support was vital to the success of #ASEVCzeSEV2024 joint meeting, and their presentations on innovative devices will undoubtedly advance EV research. A special thank you to Beckman Coulter Life Sciences for organizing the exceptional hands on workshop on measuring Extracellular Vesicles by flow cytometry.

We congratulate the winners of the three best oral presentations: Maximilian Härtinger (Austria) for his talk "Small extracellular vesicles derived from multipotent adipose stromal cells in peripheral nerve regeneration: jack of all trades, master of none?", Kerstin Menck (Germany) for her talk "Syntenin controls the expression of adhesion proteins on small extracellular vesicles" and Klára Hánělová (Czech Republic) for her talk "The importance of extracellular vesicles as potential biomarkers of head and neck cancer".

As well as the winners of the poster prizes Adrian Klepe (Austria) for his poster "EV uptake and release in a human in vitro blood-brain barrier co-culture model under ischemic conditions", Ilona Pávková (Czech Republic) for her poster "Extracellular vesicles released from macrophages infected with intracellular pathogenic bacterium Francisella tularensis" and Denisa Harvanová (Slovakia) for her poster "Potential of extracellular vesicles in the treatment and diagnostics of osteoarthritis".

We look forward to seeing you all again at ISEV Vienna 2025 next year!