Eggs remodel energy production to protect themselves from harm

Adhikari, Deepak; Carroll, John

doi:10.1038/d41586-022-01642-x

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20 July 2022

Eggs remodel energy production to protect themselves from harm

Egg cells need to stay out of harm’s way to keep the next generation healthy and free of unwanted mutations. A mechanism by which eggs avoid the ravages caused by harmful reactive oxygen species has now been discovered.

Deepak Adhikari⁰ &
John Carroll¹

Deepak Adhikari
1. Deepak Adhikari is at the Monash Biomedicine Discovery Institute, Monash University, Melbourne 3800, Australia.
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John Carroll
1. John Carroll is at the Monash Biomedicine Discovery Institute, Monash University, Melbourne 3800, Australia.
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In what seems to be a high-risk evolutionary strategy, female mammals are born with a finite reserve of immature eggs. These eggs need to be capable of avoiding harm until the end of an organism’s reproductive life — for more than 40 years in people — to remain capable of producing healthy offspring. Writing in Nature, Rodríguez-Nuevo et al.¹ have now found an adaptation that might explain how eggs stay safe for so long, related to how they produce energy.

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Nature 607, 664-665 (2022)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-022-01642-x

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