Mitchondrial DNA in Aging and Disease

Mitochondria can be found in all human cells. They are the home to many complex energy producing biochemical pathways in cellular respiration such as the Krebs cycle and the Electron Transport Chain. One interesting feature of mitochondria is that mitochondria have DNA. In our “Understanding the Human Genome” class, we have focused mainly on the portion of the Human Genome in the nucleus. However, not much attention has been paid to a section of the genome found in the mitochondrion: mitochondrial DNA, (or mtDNA). MtDNA is only 16,569 base pairs in length, less than 1/300,000th of the entire human genome (Miller), yet mtDNA it has some properties that carry important implications. In this essay, I would like to discuss some important properties of mitochondrial DNA, and the implications of these properties on forensic DNA testing, on eukaryotic evolutionary history, and on human aging and disease.

Although mtDNA is very short in length, it is very efficient: the percentage of the encoding regions in mtDNA is quite high. It codes for the ribosomal RNA and the transfer RNA that are used in the mitochond

Some topics in this essay:
Learning Center, Diseases Aside, Theory Aging, DNA Wallace, Warren Researchers, Syndrome KSS, Life Extension, Human Genome, Properties Mitochonria, Interestingly DNA, nuclear dna, free radicals, electron transport chain, electron transport, transport chain, free radical, mtdna-related diseases, hydroxyl free, mitochondrial dna, learning center, hydrogen peroxide, dna learning center, hydroxyl free radical, hydroxyl free radicals, mutation rate mtdna,