High frequency of somatic mitochondrial DNA mutations in human thyroid carcinomas and complex I respiratory defect in thyroid cancer cell lines

Significant progress has been made to elucidate the molecular mechanisms that determine thyroid tumor development and progression. However, most investigations have mainly focused on the genetic alterations of nuclear DNA. The potential role of mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) mutations in thyroid tumorigenesis is not well defined. In the present study, we investigated the frequency of mtDNA mutations in 24 thyroid tumor specimens (19 primary papillary thyroid carcinomas (PTC), one follicular thyroid carcinoma, and four multinodular hyperplasias) and four thyroid cancer cell lines by sequencing the entire coding regions of mitochondrial genome. Among the 19 PTC samples tested, seven (36.8%) had somatic mutations. Somatic mtDNA mutations were also detected in one of four multinodular hyperplasias examined. All the thyroid tumor cell lines carried sequence variations that change amino acid and have not been reported previously as normal sequence variants. Flow cytometry analysis of mitochondria respiratory function in the thyroid tumor cell lines revealed a severe defect in mitochondrial complex I activity. The majority of the mutations was involved in genes located in the complex I of the mitochondrial genome. The mutations were either A-->G or C-->T transitions, often resulting in a change of a moderately or highly conserved amino acid of their corresponding protein. These data suggest that mtDNA mutations may play an important role in the thyroid tumorigenesis. Given that mtDNA mutation is present in the benign multinodular hyperplasia, it might be involved in the early stage of tumor development.