Studies on Mitochondrial and
Heat Shock Proteins

Mitochondria are essential cellular organelles responsible for production of most of the cellular energy. It is currently believed that under normal conditions proteins made within the mitochondria or targeted to this organelle reside and function only within this compartment. However, in recent years, numerous examples of mit-proteins, both nuclear DNA encoded and mit-DNA encoded, that are present at specific extramitochondrial sites have been discovered. Many of these proteins carry out novel functions at these extra-mitochondrial locations. My lab has pioneered the study of these proteins and our work strongly suggests that proteins can exit from mitochondria to other specific cellular locations and their functions are not limited to within mitochondria.

This area of research is no longer being pursued in our lab. For our work in this area, please see publications.