Novel approach to quantify mitochondrial content and intrinsic bioenergetic efficiency across organs

Abstract

Human disease pathophysiology commonly involves metabolic disruption at both the cellular and subcellular levels. Isolated mitochondria are a powerful model for separating global cellular changes from intrinsic mitochondrial alterations. However, common laboratory practices for isolating mitochondria (e.g., differential centrifugation) routinely results in organelle preparations with variable mitochondrial purity. To overcome this issue, we developed a mass spectrometry-based method that quantitatively evaluates sample-specific percent mitochondrial enrichment. Sample-specific mitochondrial enrichment was then used to correct various biochemical readouts of mitochondrial function to a ‘fixed’ amount of mitochondrial protein, thus allowing for intrinsic mitochondrial bioenergetics, relative to the underlying proteome, to be assessed across multiple mouse tissues (e.g., heart, brown adipose, kidney, liver). Our results support the use of mitochondrial-targeted nLC-MS/MS as a method to quantitate mitochondrial enrichment on a per-sample basis, allowing for unbiased comparison of functional parameters between populations of mitochondria isolated from metabolically distinct tissues. This method can easily be applied across multiple experimental settings in which intrinsic shifts in the mitochondrial network are suspected of driving a given physiological or pathophysiological outcome.

Document Details

Document Type
Pub Defense Publication
Publication Date
Oct 19, 2020
Source ID
10.1038/s41598-020-74718-1

Entities

People

  • Ashley R. Wooten
  • Hannah S. Coalson
  • James T. Hagen
  • Kelsey H Fisher-Wellman
  • Kelsey L. Mclaughlin
  • Kimberly A. Kew
  • Margaret A. M. Nelson

Organizations

  • United States Department of Defense

Tags

Fields of Study

  • Biology

Readers

  • Aquatic Ecology
  • Cellular and Molecular Pathways of Apoptosis.
  • Trauma Surgery or Emergency Medicine.

Technology Areas

  • Biotechnology