Abstract
Iron is involved in many biological processes essential for sustaining life. In excess, iron is toxic due to its ability to catalyze the formation of free radicals that damage macromolecules. Organisms have developed specialized mechanisms to tightly regulate iron uptake, storage and efflux. Over the past decades, vertebrate model organisms have led to the identification of key genes and pathways that regulate systemic and cellular iron metabolism. This review provides an overview of iron metabolism in the roundworm Caenorhabditis elegans and highlights recent studies on the role of hypoxia and insulin signaling in the regulation of iron metabolism. Given that iron, hypoxia and insulin signaling pathways are evolutionarily conserved, C. elegans provides a genetic model organism that promises to provide new insights into mechanisms regulating mammalian iron metabolism.
Highlights
Iron is essential due to its presence in proteins involved in key metabolic processes such as DNA synthesis, mitochondrial respiration, and oxygen transport
C. elegans orthologs have been identified for many human genes (Shaye and Greenwald, 2011) and many of the key genes and pathways regulating mammalian iron metabolism are conserved in C. elegans
This review provides an overview of our current understanding of iron metabolism in C. elegans, how iron metabolism integrates with oxygen and insulin signaling, and how this genetic model can provide insights in mammalian iron metabolism
Summary
Reviewed by: Deliang Zhang, National Institute of Child Health and Human Development – National Institute of Health, USA Deborah Chiabrando, University of Torino, Italy. Iron is involved in many biological processes essential for sustaining life. Organisms have developed specialized mechanisms to tightly regulate iron uptake, storage and efflux. Vertebrate model organisms have led to the identification of key genes and pathways that regulate systemic and cellular iron metabolism. This review provides an overview of iron metabolism in the roundworm Caenorhabditis elegans and highlights recent studies on the role of hypoxia and insulin signaling in the regulation of iron metabolism. Hypoxia and insulin signaling pathways are evolutionarily conserved, C. elegans provides a genetic model organism that promises to provide new insights into mechanisms regulating mammalian iron metabolism
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