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Mitochondrial DNA Mutations in Tumors

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Cellular Respiration and Carcinogenesis

Abstract

Mitochondria are subcellular organelles with the most well-known and best-characterized function of adenosine triphosphate (ATP) production through oxidative phosphorylation (OXPHOS). Mitochondria play an important role in apoptosis, a fundamental biological process by which cells die in a programmed manner and are the strategic point in the cell death cascade. Alterations in respiratory activity and mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) abnormalities appear to be a general feature of malignant cells. The presence of mtDNA mutations has been reported in most types of cancer. However, the functional consequences and clinical relevance of these mutations are not clear.

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Acknowledgment

This work was partly supported by an intramural grant from The Faculty of Biology, University of Warsaw and grant NN 401 2327 33 from the Ministry of Science and Higher Education.

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  1. Department of Genetics and Biotechnology, Faculty of Biology, University of Warsaw, and Institute of Biochemistry and Biophysics, Polish Academy of sciences, Pawinskiego 5a, 02106 Warsaw, Poland

    Ewa Bartnik

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  1. Anna Czarnecka
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  2. Ewa Bartnik
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Correspondence to Ewa Bartnik .

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    © 2009 Humana Press, a part of Springer Science+Business Media, LLC

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    Czarnecka, A., Bartnik, E. (2009). Mitochondrial DNA Mutations in Tumors. In: Sarangarajan, R., Apte, S. (eds) Cellular Respiration and Carcinogenesis. Humana Press. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-59745-435-3_9

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