Segregation of mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) is an important underlying pathogenic factor in mtDNA mutation accumulation in mitochondrial diseases and aging, but the molecular mechanisms of mtDNA segregation are elusive. Lack of high-throughput single-cell mutation load assays lies at the root of the paucity of studies in which, at the single-cell level, mitotic mtDNA segregation patterns have been...

Mitochondrial respiratory function is impaired in the target tissues of patients with mitochondrial diseases and declines with age in various human tissues. It is generally accepted that respiratory-chain defects result in enhanced production of reactive oxygen species and free radicals in mitochondria. Recently, we have demonstrated that the copy number of mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) is increase...

Cell-free nuclear (cf-nDNA) and mitochondrial (cf-mDNA) DNA are released from damaged cells in type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) patients, contributing to adverse cardiac remodeling, vascular dysfunction, inflammation. The purpose of this study was correlate the presence cf-DNAs with HF T2DM patients. A total 612 patients were prescreened by using a local database, 240 (120 non-HF 120 individuals...

Background: Mitochondrial biomarkers have been investigated in different critical settings, including ST-elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI). Whether they provide prognostic information STEMI, complementary to troponins, has not fully elucidated. We prospectively explored the in-hospital and long-term implications of cytochrome c cell-free mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) STEMI patients undergoing...

Advanced maternal age and in vitro embryo production (IVP) predispose to pregnancy loss in horses. We investigated whether mare age and IVP were associated with alterations in mitochondrial (mt) DNA copy number or function that could compromise oocyte and embryo development. Effects of mare age (<12 vs ≥12 years) on mtDNA copy number, ATP content and expression of genes involved in mitochondria...

The mitochondrial theory of aging proposes that reactive oxygen species (ROS) generated inside the cell will lead, with time, to increasing amounts of oxidative damage to various cell components. The main site for ROS production is the respiratory chain inside the mitochondria and accumulation of mtDNA mutations, and impaired respiratory chain function have been associated with degenerative dis...

rho 0 HeLa cells entirely lacking mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) and mitochondrial transfection techniques were used to examine intermitochondrial interactions between mitochondria with and without mtDNA, and also between those with wild-type (wt) and mutant-type mtDNA in living human cells. First, unambiguous evidence was obtained that the DNA-binding dyes ethidium bromide (EtBr) and 4',6-diamidino...

BACKGROUND Mitochondria play an important role in cellular energy metabolism, free radical production, and apoptosis, and thus may be involved in cancer development. METHODS We evaluated mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) copy number in peripheral leukocytes in relation to colorectal cancer risk in a case-control study of 444 colorectal cancer cases and 1,423 controls nested in the Shanghai Women's He...

The peculiar biology of mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) potentially has detrimental consequences for organismal health and lifespan. Typically, eukaryotic cells contain multiple mitochondria, each with multiple mtDNA genomes. The high copy number of mtDNA implies that selection on mtDNA functionality is relaxed. Furthermore, because mtDNA replication is not strictly regulated, within-cell selection m...

Mitochondria contain their own DNA (mtDNA), which codes for 13 proteins (all subunits of the respiratory chain complexes), 22 tRNAs and 2 rRNAs. Several mtDNA point mutations as well as deletions have been shown to be causative in well-defined mitochondrial disorders. A mixture of mutated and wild type mtDNA (heteroplasmy) is found in most of these disorders. Inheritance of mtDNA is maternal, a...