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Mitochondria are small structures in cells that generate energy for the cell to use, and are hence referred to as the "powerhouses" of the cell. Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) is not transmitted through nuclear DNA (nDNA). In humans, as in most multicellular organisms, mitochondrial DNA is inherited only from the mother's ovum.
The Mitochondrial Eve can change, when a mother-daughter line comes to an end. It follows from the definition of Mitochondrial Eve that she had at least two daughters who both have unbroken female lineages that have survived to the present day. In every generation mitochondrial lineages end – when a woman with unique mtDNA dies with no daughters.
The hypothetical woman at the root of all these groups (meaning just the mitochondrial DNA haplogroups) is the matrilineal most recent common ancestor (MRCA) for all currently living humans. She is commonly called Mitochondrial Eve. The rate at which mitochondrial DNA mutates is known as the mitochondrial molecular clock. It is an area of ...
An IVF technique known as mitochondrial donation or mitochondrial replacement therapy (MRT) results in offspring containing mtDNA from a donor female, and nuclear DNA from the mother and father. In the spindle transfer procedure, the nucleus of an egg is inserted into the cytoplasm of an egg from a donor female which has had its nucleus removed ...
In addition to nuclear DNA, humans (like almost all eukaryotes) have mitochondrial DNA. Mitochondria, the "power houses" of a cell, have their own DNA. Mitochondria are inherited from one's mother, and their DNA is frequently used to trace maternal lines of descent (see mitochondrial Eve). Mitochondrial DNA is only 16kb in length and encodes ...
Mitochondrial diseases are inherited from the mother, not from the father. Mitochondria with their mitochondrial DNA are already present in the egg cell before it gets fertilized by a sperm. In many cases of fertilization, the head of the sperm enters the egg cell; leaving its middle part, with its mitochondria, behind. The mitochondrial DNA of ...
However, there has been only a single documented case among humans in which as much as 90% of a single tissue type's mitochondria was inherited through paternal transmission. [19] According to the 2005 study More evidence for non-maternal inheritance of mitochondrial DNA?, [20] heteroplasmy is a "newly discovered form of inheritance for mtDNA ...
Rebecca L. Cann (born 1951) is a geneticist who made a scientific breakthrough on mitochondrial DNA variation and evolution in humans, popularly called Mitochondrial Eve.Her discovery that all living humans are genetically descended from a single African mother who lived <200,000 years ago became the foundation of the Out of Africa theory, the most widely accepted explanation of the origin of ...