Abstract 2486 Allocation of mitochondrial heme inside cells: Identification and roles of four proteins that enable a complete heme transfer pathway

Heme is a metallocofactor essential in physiology that is synthesized inside the mitochondria in eukaryotes. Mechanisms that enable and regulate mitochondrial heme distribution in cells are fundamentally important. Our previous work established that GAPDH binds mitochondrially-generated heme for intracellular delivery to numerous hemeproteins that mature outside the mitochondria and need heme to function. The cell chaperone Hsp90 participates by driving final insertion of the heme. But how GAPDH obtains mitochondrial heme is still unclear.