Oxygen, Stress, and Antioxidants (Ron Mittler, PhD)

March 8, 2022
NextGen Precision Health Discovery Series
https://precisionhealth.missouri.edu/...

"Oxygen, Stress, and Antioxidants - Should We Be Scared of Reactive Oxygen Species?"
Speaker:
Ron Mittler, PhD
Division of Plant Sciences and Technology, MU College of Agriculture Food and Natural Resources and Interdisciplinary Plant Group; and Department of Surgery, MU School of Medicine

Description
Oxygen is essential for life, but it also has a dark side. In the presence of oxygen (that is abundant in our atmosphere) all cells can and do produce toxic compounds called reactive oxygen species. These compounds can attack proteins, DNA, lipids, and other cellular components and induce a dangerous state called ‘oxidative stress’. The damaged caused by reactive oxygen species was blamed for aging, cancer and several other diseases, and a whole industry of antioxidants (for example, Vitamin C and E) emerged on the basis of this blame. In recent years however a complete overhaul of this concept is taking precedence, and numerous studies have shown that reactive oxygen species are required for life, acting as important regulators of many essential processes in different organisms. Examples for these include the immune response, proliferation of stem cells, and responses of cells to different stresses and pathogens. So, what should we believe? In this presentation, Dr. Mittler provided a balanced view of these two opposing viewpoints and showed by using different examples that, as with almost everything in life, balance is the answer.

Learning objectives:

What are reactive oxygen species?
How are they produced and controlled in cells?
How are they used as important signaling molecules?
How can we avoid oxidative stress?
About the Speaker Mittler Headshot
Education:

1986-1989, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Agriculture, B.A. & M.Sc. (Cum Laude)
1990-1993, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, Ph.D. in Biochemistry
Memberships in professional societies:

American Society of Plant Biologists (ASPB),
American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS),
American Physiological Society (APS)
Honors: 2014-Present Thomson Reuters/Clarivate Analytics Highly Cited Researcher (8 years in a row)

Editor/Editorial Board member: Plant Journal, Trends in Plant Science, Antioxidants, Physiologia Plantarum.

Since moving to MU in 2019, Dr. Mittler has published over 50 papers and obtained over $2.5M in grants.