Mitochondrial network complexity emerges from fission/fusion dynamics. Academic Article uri icon

Overview

abstract

  • Mitochondrial networks exhibit a variety of complex behaviors, including coordinated cell-wide oscillations of energy states as well as a phase transition (depolarization) in response to oxidative stress. Since functional and structural properties are often interwinded, here we characterized the structure of mitochondrial networks in mouse embryonic fibroblasts using network tools and percolation theory. Subsequently we perturbed the system either by promoting the fusion of mitochondrial segments or by inducing mitochondrial fission. Quantitative analysis of mitochondrial clusters revealed that structural parameters of healthy mitochondria laid in between the extremes of highly fragmented and completely fusioned networks. We confirmed our results by contrasting our empirical findings with the predictions of a recently described computational model of mitochondrial network emergence based on fission-fusion kinetics. Altogether these results offer not only an objective methodology to parametrize the complexity of this organelle but also support the idea that mitochondrial networks behave as critical systems and undergo structural phase transitions.

publication date

  • January 10, 2018

Research

keywords

  • Mitochondria
  • Mitochondrial Dynamics
  • Models, Biological

Identity

PubMed Central ID

  • PMC5762699

Scopus Document Identifier

  • 85040464319

Digital Object Identifier (DOI)

  • 10.1038/srep13924

PubMed ID

  • 29321534

Additional Document Info

volume

  • 8

issue

  • 1