The role of mitochondria in cellular toxicity as a potential drug target

Abstract

Mitochondrial malfunction is related to aging and to the onset of many diseases, such as obesity/diabetes, cancer, and cardiovascular and neurodegenerative diseases. The molecular principles of biological and toxicological processes the mitochondria can regulate should be disease-specific, cell type-specific, and drug targetable. Mitochondrial biology and toxicology is evolving and undergoing a revolution through fast-developing biotechnologies garnering increasing attention due to the importance of targeted therapies. Mitochondrial energy production and metabolism are conducted via post-mitochondrial signaling, and are controlled by extra-mitochondrial pathways. Mitochondrial biology and toxicology has a history spanning over 30 years and is one of the main scientific focuses at Cell Biology and Toxicology. It is our aim to pioneer innovations of mitochondrial biology and toxicology to improve the understanding, highlight the latest development, and find mitochondria-based targets for therapies. It is expected to know how drugs can initiate mitochondrial dysfunction, the role of nuclear messages in regulating mitochondrial DNA (MtDNA), and how mitochondria communicate between or with other cells. Further studies are crucial to discover how mitochondria control the process of immune response, autophagy/mitophagy, genome activation, and cell interaction. It is also needed to innovate how the transcription is started and terminated within mitochondria, the cytosolic proteins and other organelles interact with mitochondria, and MtDNA regulates the function of mitochondrial respiratory megacomplexes.

Effects of Pyrroloquinoline Quinone on Lipid Metabolism and Anti-Oxidative Capacity in a High-Fat-Diet Metabolic Dysfunction-Associated Fatty Liver Disease Chick Model

“…The activity of liver enzymes denoting liver injury [49,50] including ALT, AST, and GGT were observably increased upon FFA induction, while was suppressed by the PQQ treatment. Mitochondrial malfunction is related to the onset of many diseases, and mtDNA encodes vital respiratory machinery of mitochondria [55]. mtDNA content could be regarded as an indicator of mitochondria biosynthesis.…”

Molecular regulation and clinical significance of caveolin‐1 methylation in chronic lung diseases

“…Cav‐1, especially altered DNA methylation patterns in the promoter region, was associated with chronic lung diseases. Treatment with DNA methyltransferase inhibitor can activate Cav‐1 through demethylation of CpGi shores as therapeutic potentials for lung diseases, although there still are a large number of challenges to be overcome to meet criteria of disease‐specific biomarkers and targets to dynamically monitor disease severity, duration, stage, and response to therapy 96‐111 . Understanding of Cav‐1 may contribute to developing the new therapies.…”

Clinical trans-omics: an integration of clinical phenomes with molecular multiomics

“…Therapeutic targets can be molecules or subcellular organelles that are mainly dependent upon critical and specific biological functions Wu et al, 2018). Multiomics can play a unique and important role in the identification of therapeutic targets in clinical trials, while the role in target validation should be further clarified.…”