John Hewitt in Phys.Org:
Insofar as variants for mitochondrial disease are supposed to be rare in the genome, don’t think for even a minute that it can’t happen to you. In fact, the closer one looks at the full mitonuclear genomes of normal folks, the more one realizes that no one is actually normal—we are all, shall we say, temporarily asymptomatic. But in the fullness of time, many asymptomatics develop the hallmarks of mitochondrial disease. While mitochondrial underperformance is ultimately behind many specific disease processes like the accumulation of unburnt fatty acids in fatty liver disease, or the clogging debris in degenerating tubules in renal disease, cancer is the entropic cellular eventuality for which we must all prepare. Depending on which organ, and which kind of tumor, cancer can be both a big bang and heat death of our existence—and both are controlled by mitochondrial energy.
…Enter the new and improved mitochondrial uploader—the MitoPunch. This pressure-driven device uses tiny mechanical plungers to deliver much larger cargoes using massively parallel arrays into various kinds of cells. The plunger deforms a pliable polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) reservoir containing isolated mitochondria and propels through a porous membrane containing numerous 3-μm-diameter holes and into cell cytoplasm. The schema would be to take out some cells, mitopunch them, and then put them back in strategic places. One might even envision future refinements of the device that could be introduced via catheters in the circulatory system to reach targets deep in the heart, lung, muscle or even the brain.
More here.