0000000000915077
AUTHOR
J G De La Asuncion
Mitochondrial glutathione oxidation correlates with age-associated oxidative damage to mitochondrial DNA
Mitochondria may be primary targets of free radical damage associated with aging. We have found that mitochondrial glutathione is markedly oxidized with aging in rats and mice. The oxidized to reduced glutathione ratio rises with aging in the liver, kidney, and brain. The magnitude of these changes is much higher than that previously found in whole cells of any species previously studied. In the liver, this ratio (expressing GSSG as a percent of GSH) changed from 0.77 +/- 0.19% (n=5) in young rats to 2.47 +/- 1.25% (n=5) in old ones, i.e., 320% of the controls. In the brain and kidney, values for old rats were, respectively, 600 and 540% higher than those of young rats. A marked oxidation o…
AZT treatment induces molecular and ultrastructural oxidative damage to muscle mitochondria. Prevention by antioxidant vitamins.
AIDS patients who receive zidovudine (AZT) frequently suffer from myopathy. This has been attributed to mitochondrial (mt) damage, and specifically to the loss of mtDNA. This study examines whether AZT causes oxidative damage to DNA in patients and to skeletal muscle mitochondria in mice, and whether this damage may be prevented by supranutritional doses of antioxidant vitamins. Asymptomatic HIV-infected patients treated with AZT have a higher urinary excretion (355+/-100 pmol/kg/d) of 8-oxo-7, 8-dihydro-2'-deoxyguanosine (8-oxo-dG) (a marker of oxidative damage to DNA) than untreated controls (asymptomatic HIV-infected patients) (182+/-29 pmol/kg/d). This was prevented (110+/-79 pmol/kg/d)…