POWERHOUSE BIOLOGY is a communal effort to communicate mitochondrial disease, mitochondrial dysfunction, and a moonshot endeavor to enable human genome consolidation to the public.
Mitochondria carry a distinctly non-human, inaccessible portion of the human genome. Mitochondria cannot access the extensive set of DNA quality control and repair mechanisms that protect nuclear DNA. As a result, our mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) accumulates mutations and large deletions from the moment we are conceived. Some of us are born with one out of a large collection of detrimental changes in mtDNA, the results of which are collectively referred to as mitochondrial disease.
That’s not all. Additional complications arise from miscommunication between the mitochondrial and nuclear genomes, resulting in an imbalance in the molecules necessary for oxidative phosphorylation (OXPHOS). OXPHOS is a chain of events that involves all 13 mtDNA-encoded proteins and their nuclear-encoded collaborators, generating energy. Imbalance in metabolites or system components impair mitochondrial performance. Combined, these phenomena lead to mitochondrial dysfunction.
Mitochondrial dysfunction is a phrase used to describe literally anything that’s wrong with the function of the mitochondria, and it has equally broad consequences. In biomanufacturing, exhausted cells may not reach cost-effective production yields. Cell therapies fail. When left unchecked, in humans, mitochondrial dysfunction contributes to late-onset neurodegenerative diseases such as Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s, amongst others.
We’re on a mission to reboot the human powerplant.
The transformative technology at the basis of this moonshot endeavor will accelerate progress in the aging and longevity community, move the frontiers of synthetic biology, and shape commercial initiatives that target mitochondrial disease and dysfunction.