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Summary
Sustaining a healthy population of mitochondria in a neuron requires a balance of de novo biogenesis of new mitochondria or mitochondrial components and removal of damaged mitochondrial membrane, proteins, and DNA (1, 2). Recent evidence suggests that mitochondria must be actively transported between the cell body and axon (2). A new study by Davis et al. (3) offers a surprising alternative: Axons expel mitochondria to neighboring astrocytes for degradation. This unexpected finding might reshape how we think of mitochondrial disposal in the nervous system.
