{"id":210899,"date":"2025-04-08T17:11:17","date_gmt":"2025-04-08T22:11:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2025\/04\/how-cells-repair-their-mitochondria-research-uncovers-a-specialized-recycling-system"},"modified":"2025-04-08T17:11:17","modified_gmt":"2025-04-08T22:11:17","slug":"how-cells-repair-their-mitochondria-research-uncovers-a-specialized-recycling-system","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2025\/04\/how-cells-repair-their-mitochondria-research-uncovers-a-specialized-recycling-system","title":{"rendered":"How cells repair their mitochondria: Research uncovers a specialized recycling system"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/how-cells-repair-their-mitochondria-research-uncovers-a-specialized-recycling-system2.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Damage to the genetic material of mitochondria\u2014the mitochondrial DNA or mtDNA for short\u2014can lead to diseases such as Parkinson\u2019s, Alzheimer\u2019s, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), cardiovascular diseases and type 2 diabetes. Such damage also speeds up the aging process. However, the cells are normally capable of identifying such damage and reacting.<\/p>\n<p>Scientists from University Hospital D\u00fcsseldorf and HHU have\u2014in collaboration with the University of Cologne and the Center for Molecular Medicine Cologne (CMMC)\u2014discovered a mechanism which protects and repairs the mitochondria. The research team, headed by Professor Pla-Mart\u00edn from the Institute of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology I at HHU, has identified a specialized recycling system, which cells activate when they identify damage to the mtDNA.<\/p>\n<p>According to the authors in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.science.org\/doi\/10.1126\/sciadv.adr6415\" target=\"_blank\"><i>Science Advances<\/i><\/a>, this mechanism relies on a <a href=\"https:\/\/phys.org\/tags\/protein+complex\/\" rel=\"tag\" class=\"\">protein complex<\/a> known as retromer and the lysosomes\u2014cell organelles containing digestive enzymes. These special cellular compartments act like recycling centers, eliminating the damaged genetic material.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Damage to the genetic material of mitochondria\u2014the mitochondrial DNA or mtDNA for short\u2014can lead to diseases such as Parkinson\u2019s, Alzheimer\u2019s, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), cardiovascular diseases and type 2 diabetes. Such damage also speeds up the aging process. However, the cells are normally capable of identifying such damage and reacting. Scientists from University Hospital D\u00fcsseldorf [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":396,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,412,269,47],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-210899","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-biotech-medical","category-genetics","category-life-extension","category-neuroscience"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/210899","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/396"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=210899"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/210899\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=210899"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=210899"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=210899"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}