HOUSTONâJustin Friendâs parents have doctoral degrees and have worked as university lecturers and researchers. So Mr. Friend might have been expected to head for a university after graduating from high school in Bryan, Texas, five years ago. Instead, he attended Texas State Technical College in Waco, and received a two-year degree in welding.
A flurry of emergent research has linked mitochondrial dysfunction to the pathogenesis of Parkinson's disease. Mitochondrial dysfunction results in impaired ATP generation, loss of cellular repair mechanisms, and cellular inefficiency.
1 Mitochondrial disease includes a group of neuromuscular diseases caused by damage to intracellular structures that produce energy, the mitochondria; disease symptoms usually involve muscle contractions that are weak or spontaneous. 2  There is no specific treatment for mitochondrial diseases (myopathies).