institute of toxicology

The balance between anti-and prooxidative factors is of crucial importance for the functioning and survival of cells. If this balance is disrupted, e.g. when more reactive oxygen compounds (ROS) are formed as can be decomposed by cytoprotective enzymes or antioxidants oxidative damage results, which, if uncompensated or chronic, may ultimately lead to cell death. ROS-mediated damage plays a causal role in many chemical-induced intoxications, biological ageing, neurodegenerative diseases such as Parkinson's or Alzheimer's, in restoring blood flow after lack of oxygen resulting from ischemia, the immune response to infections, certain auto-immune diseases, and cancer. As metabolically active organs the liver and the brain are mainly affected.

Our work aims at the identification of molecular structures affected by oxidative damage, the characterization of the resulting functional impairment, and the development of new therapeutic strategies. We mainly focus on mitochondria, which, depending on the kind and extent of impairment, trigger the spectrum of cellular consequences from complete compensation of the damage over an apoptotic cell death, up to a substantial loss of function and necrotic cell death.