No life without oxygen - but oxygen can also be harmful Oxygen is necessary to life.
Humans and animals use oxygen to convert fats and sugars into the energy that keeps all life processes running and maintains the body’s temperature. At the same time, oxygen can also be harmful when it is converted into toxic oxygen particles that cause serious damage to tissues and organs.
What about a little less?
Some animals can survive in places with little oxygen. Birds at high altitudes, for example, or animals that live underground or that can dive under water for a long time. Hibernating animals turn their bodily processes down low and live with a reduced amount of oxygen.
We can detect changes in the amount of oxygen with certain sensors. These oxygen meters are essential in adapting the body’s metabolism during the changeover from an oxygen-rich to an oxygen-deficient environment.
Oxygen meter PHD1 plays crucial role
Julián Aragonés, Martin Schneider, Katie Van Geyte and Peter Fraisl - under the direction of Peter Carmeliet - have studied the role of the PHD1 oxygen meter. To do this, they used ‘knock-out’ mice that were unable to produce PHD1. They found that blocking an artery in these mice - thus obstructing the oxygen supply to the muscle - did not lead to the death of the surrounding muscular tissue. This was a very surprising result, since the muscle received too little oxygen to survive under normal circumstances. In the mice lacking the PHD1 oxygen meter, the tissue apparently ‘reprogrammed’ itself by means of a metabolic shift, so that the muscle needed less oxygen in order to continue to function. Furthermore, less oxygen in the muscle meant fewer toxic oxygen particles and thus less damage. So, the muscle could use the little oxygen that was available in a better and safer manner. These alterations enabled the muscle to stay perfectly healthy in these normally life-threatening conditions. In addition, the researchers also demonstrated that treating healthy mice even briefly with a PHD1-blocker could protect the muscles against oxygen deficiency - which opens a path to new therapies.
New therapeutic possibilities?