Mitochondrial transplants may help aging mouse hearts clear damaged mitochondria

A post describing research published in Aging Cell says aging hearts can accumulate damaged mitochondria when their cleanup process becomes congested. It says mitochondria taken from bone marrow stem cells improved heart function and eased that congestion in doxorubicin-treated and naturally aged mice. The post also describes elevated levels of two proteins involved in the process, HIF-3α and BNIP3, in older human heart tissue.