In search of new medicines, researchers have gone inside the cell to study mitochondria, tiny power plants that are key to cellular life and death, and their role in causing disease.

Malfunctioning mitochondria have been linked to cancer, immune defects, neurodegenerative diseases such as Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s, sterility and deafness. North Carolina scientists have been among those on the forefront of mitochondrial research, including a group at the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences in Research Triangle Park.

Gerald Shadel

On Tuesday, the NIEHS group hosted Gerald Shadel, a Yale University biochemist who is sort of a mitochondrion whisperer. His lab at Yale’s school of medicine tries to understand how mitochondria tell cells what to do and what happens when the communication breaks down. Read more…