https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-025-00176-2 Skip to main content Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript. Advertisement Advertisement Nature * View all journals * Search * Log in * Explore content * About the journal * Publish with us * Subscribe * Sign up for alerts * RSS feed 1. nature 2. news 3. article * NEWS * 22 January 2025 Cancer cells 'poison' the immune system with tainted mitochondria Immune cells lose their cancer-fighting prowess after taking tumours' organelles on board. By * Asher Mullard^0 1. Asher Mullard 1. Asher Mullard is a science journalist based in Ottawa. View author publications You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar * Twitter * Facebook * Email Coloured Transmission Electron Micrograph of a single mitochondrion in a human pancreas cell, shown in pink, blue and yellow colours Mitochondria (artificially coloured) are swapped between cells, contrary to an earlier dogma that they stayed with their cells of origin.Credit: K.R. Porter/SPL Cancer cells can poison attacking immune cells by filling them with defective mitochondria -- dampening the body's defensive forces and helping the tumour to evade eradication^1. These findings, published today in Nature, provide the strongest evidence to date that mitochondria, cellular sub-structures that produce energy, migrate in humans and not just in cell and animal models. "My first thought was that this sounds crazy, like science fiction. But they seem to have the data for it," says Holden Maecker, an immunologist at Stanford University in California, who was not involved in the research. "This is potentially a totally new biology that we were not looking at." Further studies are needed to understand this phenomenon's frequency and how much it benefits cancer cells, he adds. Consider the mitochondria Scientists once thought that each cell's mitochondria were made by that cell itself, but researchers are increasingly finding that mitochondria can move from one cell to another. In the Petri dish, for example, cancer cells have been found to feed their insatiable appetite for energy by stealing healthy mitochondria from immune cells called T cells^2. To learn more, the authors of the latest work sampled mitochondria from a handful of people with cancer. The researchers compared mitochondria from each person's cancer cells with those from the same individual's tumour-infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs) -- immune cells that recognize and invade tumours. [d41586-025] How cancer hijacks the nervous system to grow and spread The team found that, in three people, both the tumour cells and TILs carried mitochondria with the same mutations, suggesting that misshapen mitochondria might be jumping from diseased to healthy cells. The team engineered cancer cells to carry mitochondria that are speckled with a fluorescent protein. When these cells were grown alongside TILs, the immune cells started harbouring glowing mitochondria after 24 hours. By 15 days, cancer-derived mitochondria had supplanted some immune cells' native mitochondria almost entirely. "This challenges our notion of cellular 'ownership' of mitochondria," says Jonathon Brestoff, who studies mitochondria transfer at the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, Missouri. Poison power Tainted TILs were less able to divide and more likely to commit cell 'suicide', the team showed in cellular models. In mice with cancer, TILs that had imbibed alien mitochondria showed signs of T cell exhaustion -- the loss of cancer-killing potential. Enjoying our latest content? Login or create an account to continue * Access the most recent journalism from Nature's award-winning team * Explore the latest features & opinion covering groundbreaking research Access through your institution or Sign in or create an account # Continue with Google # Continue with ORCiD doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-025-00176-2 Read the related News & Views, 'Mitochondrial swap helps cancer fight immune cells'. References 1. Ikeda, H. et al. Nature https://doi.org/10.1038/ s41586-024-08439-0 (2025). Article Google Scholar 2. Saha, T. et al. Nature Nanotechnol. 17, 98-106 (2022). Article PubMed Google Scholar Download references Reprints and permissions Related Articles * [d41586-025] A new kind of mitochondrion * [d41586-025] Could mitochondria help athletes to make gains? * [d41586-025] Scientists make precise gene edits to mitochondrial DNA for first time * [d41586-025] Natural killer cells show their cancer-fighting worth * [d41586-025] How to trick the immune system into attacking tumours Subjects * Cell biology * Cancer * Immunology Latest on: Cell biology Imaging reveals how plants cope with salt Imaging reveals how plants cope with salt News & Views 15 JAN 25 Targeting FOXM1 condensates reduces breast tumour growth and metastasis Targeting FOXM1 condensates reduces breast tumour growth and metastasis Article 15 JAN 25 Autoactive CNGC15 enhances root endosymbiosis in legume and wheat Autoactive CNGC15 enhances root endosymbiosis in legume and wheat Article 15 JAN 25 Cancer Immune evasion through mitochondrial transfer in the tumour microenvironment Immune evasion through mitochondrial transfer in the tumour microenvironment Article 22 JAN 25 Mitochondrial swap from cancer to immune cells thwarts anti-tumour defences Mitochondrial swap from cancer to immune cells thwarts anti-tumour defences News & Views 22 JAN 25 How to trick the immune system into attacking tumours How to trick the immune system into attacking tumours News 17 JAN 25 Immunology CD45-PET is a robust, non-invasive tool for imaging inflammation CD45-PET is a robust, non-invasive tool for imaging inflammation Article 22 JAN 25 Mitochondrial swap from cancer to immune cells thwarts anti-tumour defences Mitochondrial swap from cancer to immune cells thwarts anti-tumour defences News & Views 22 JAN 25 Tissue-resident memory CD8 T cell diversity is spatiotemporally imprinted Tissue-resident memory CD8 T cell diversity is spatiotemporally imprinted Article 22 JAN 25 Nature Careers Jobs * Invitation to Apply for Excellent Youth Science Fund Project (Overseas) Researchers in the fields of life sciences, healthcare, or the intersection of medicine, industry, and information technology. 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Hangzhou, Zhejiang, China School of Clinical Medicine, Hangzhou Normal University [] * Professor/Associate Professor/Assistant Professor/Senior Lecturer /Lecturer The School of Science and Engineering (SSE) at The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen (CUHK-Shenzhen) sincerely invites applications for mul... Shenzhen, China The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen (CUHK Shenzhen) [] Related Articles * [d41586-025] A new kind of mitochondrion * [d41586-025] Could mitochondria help athletes to make gains? * [d41586-025] Scientists make precise gene edits to mitochondrial DNA for first time * [d41586-025] Natural killer cells show their cancer-fighting worth * [d41586-025] How to trick the immune system into attacking tumours Subjects * Cell biology * Cancer * Immunology Advertisement Sign up to Nature Briefing An essential round-up of science news, opinion and analysis, delivered to your inbox every weekday. Email address [ ] [ ] Yes! 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