REVIEW article
Front. Cell. Infect. Microbiol.
Sec. Clinical Infectious Diseases
This article is part of the Research TopicDecoding the Mito-Immune Axis: Impact of Mitochondria on Immune Regulation and Pathogen DefenseView all 3 articles
Pathogen-Induced Mitochondrial Dysfunction: Mechanistic Insights, Immune Crosstalk, and Therapeutic Opportunities
Provisionally accepted
- Departmemt of Respiratory Medicine, First Affiliated Hospital of Soochow University, Suzhou, China
Select one of your emails
You have multiple emails registered with Frontiers:
Notify me on publication
Please enter your email address:
If you already have an account, please login
You don't have a Frontiers account ? You can register here
Mitochondria have emerged as multifunctional organelles central to cellular metabolism, innate immunity, and cell fate determination. Increasing evidence demonstrates that pathogens-including viruses, bacteria, fungi, and parasites-target mitochondria to modulate host immune responses and metabolic reprogramming. Disruption of mitochondrial dynamics, excessive reactive oxygen species (ROS) generation, mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) release, and altered mitophagy represent key hallmarks of pathogen-induced mitochondrial dysfunction. These processes not only compromise cellular bioenergetics but also influence immune signaling cascades, such as cGAS-STING and NLRP3 inflammasome pathways, thereby shaping infection outcomes. This review synthesizes the latest findings on how distinct pathogen classes orchestrate mitochondrial damage and explores their implications for infection biology and immune regulation. Furthermore, we highlight emerging mitochondria-targeted therapeutic strategies and future research directions aimed at mitigating infection-induced mitochondrial pathology.
Keywords: Mitochondria, Infection, mitochondrial dynamics, pathogens, Host defense
Received: 28 Sep 2025; Accepted: 17 Nov 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Yang, Zeng, Liu and Huang. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Zeyi Liu, zeyiliu@suda.edu.cn
Jian-an Huang, huang_jian_an@163.com
Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.