Running on empty: Mitochondria without mtDNA exhibit differential motility and connectivity

Plant mitochondria are in continuous motion. While providing ATP to other cellular processes, they also constantly consume ATP to move rapidly within the cell. This movement is in part related to taking up, converting and delivering metabolites and energy to and from different parts of the cell. Plant mitochondria have varying amounts of DNA even within a single cell, from none to the full mitochondrial genome. Because mitochondrial dynamics are altered in a mutant with disrupted DNA maintenance, we hypothesised that exchanging DNA templates for repair is one of the functions of their movement and interactions. Here, we stain mitochondrial DNA while tracking mitochondrial position to investigate differences in the behaviour of mitochondria with and without DNA. We have also developed a fluorescent mitochondrial DNA binding protein that will enable future understanding of mitochondrial dynamics, genome maintenance and replication. We demonstrated that mitochondria without mtDNA have altered physical behaviour and have a lower immediate connectivity to the rest of the population, further supporting a link between the physical and genetic dynamics of these complex organelles.