Mitochondrial misreading in skeletal muscle accelerates metabolic aging and confers lipid accumulation and increased inflammation.

We have recently reported on an experimental model of mitochondrial mistranslation conferred by amino acid exchange V338Y in the mitochondrial ribosomal protein MrpS5. Here we used a combination of RNA-Seq and metabolic profiling of homozygous transgenic MrpS5V338Y/V338Y mice to analyze the changes associated with the V338Y mutation in post-mitotic skeletal muscle. Metabolic profiling demonstrated age-dependent metabolic changes in the mutant V338Y animals, which included enhanced levels of age-associated metabolites and which were accompanied by increased glycolysis, lipid desaturation and eicosanoid biosynthesis, and alterations of the pentose phosphate pathway. In addition, transcriptome signatures of aged V338Y mutant muscle pointed to elevated inflammation, likely reflecting the increased levels of bioactive lipids. Our findings indicate that mistranslation-mediated chronic impairment of mitochondrial function affects specific bioenergetic processes in muscle in an age-dependent manner.

High-level resistance to isoniazid and ethionamide in multidrug-resistant Mycobacterium tuberculosis of the Lisboa family is associated with inhA double mutations.

OBJECTIVES: The purpose of this study was to determine the levels of isoniazid and ethionamide resistance and to identify associated mutations in endemic multidrug-resistant (MDR) strains of Mycobacterium tuberculosis from the Lisbon metropolitan area, Portugal. METHODS: Seventeen clinical MDR tuberculosis (TB) strains were characterized by standard and semi-quantitative drug susceptibility testing to assess the level of isoniazid and ethionamide resistance. The genes katG, inhA, ethA and ndh were screened for mutations. All strains were genotyped by 24 loci mycobacterial interspersed repetitive unit-variable number of tandem repeats (MIRU-VNTR) analysis. RESULTS: All strains showed high-level resistance to both isoniazid (>1 mg/L) and ethionamide (>25 mg/L). MIRU-VNTR typing revealed the presence of two main clusters, Lisboa3 and Q1, in 16/17 strains, all of which showed the C-15T mutation in the promoter region of the inhA gene. The 16 strains belong to the Latino-American-Mediterranean (LAM) genotype and the other strain belongs to the Beijing genotype. Sequencing of the inhA open reading frame revealed that the 16 strains also had mutations in the structural region of the gene, leading to the S94A substitution in 9 strains and the I194T substitution in 7 strains. CONCLUSIONS: The results reveal that the presence of a mutation in the inhA regulatory region together with a mutation in the inhA coding region can lead to the development of high-level isoniazid resistance and cross-resistance to ethionamide among the MDR-TB strains circulating in Lisbon. This mutational pattern also hints to a possible involvement of strain-specific factors that could be a feature of the Portuguese MDR-TB strains where the LAM family is the major circulating genotype.

Mitochondrial ribosome as the target for the macrolide antibiotic clarithromycin in the helminth Echinococcus multilocularis.

The mitochondrial rRNA of the tapeworm species Echinococcus multilocularis carries an adenine at sequence position 2058 (numbering according to that for Escherichia coli) of the large-subunit rRNA (lsrRNA), while the nucleus-encoded rRNA, as determined in this study, is characterized by 2058G. This indicates a dichotomy in the drug susceptibilities of ribosomes: cytoplasmic ribosomes are predicted to be resistant to macrolide antibiotics, while mitochondrial ribosomes lack the most common chromosomal resistance determinant, lsrRNA 2058G. Upon incubation with the macrolide clarithromycin, the formation of vesicles from metacestode tissue was reduced in a dose-dependent manner. Electron microscopy revealed distinct morphological alterations both of the mitochondria and of the vesicle wall (e.g., loss of microtriches) in drug-treated vesicles. Adult worms lost their motility and displayed morphological changes (shortening and constriction of proglottids and the presence of vacuoles) upon incubation with clarithromycin. Our findings demonstrate that macrolides have distinct in vitro effects on E. multilocularis, endorsing the use of sequence-based in silico approaches for exploitation of available ribosomal drugs as anthelmintic agents.