It was hypothesized that mitochondrial dysfunction was critical in the initiation of ferroptosis. The immunofluorescence staining analysis indicated that MPV17 was localized within the mitochondria, indicating its regulatory role in mitochondrial homeostasis (
Figure 3A). Firstly, we detected the mitochondrial membrane potential though the JC-1 staining and flow cytometry. The decreased mitochondrial membrane potential was observed under FAC treatment, while concurrent overexpression of MPV17 partially restored mitochondrial membrane potential (
Figure 3B,C). Then, we detected the distribution of lipid peroxides through the C11-BO staining and confocal imaging. It was observed that lipid peroxides mainly accumulated in the mitochondria of cardiomyocytes treated with FAC, which indicating the critical role of mitochondria in ferroptosis initiation (
Figure 3D). Overexpression of MPV17 prevented lipid peroxides accumulation in the mitochondria of cardiomyocytes treated with FAC, while knockdown of MPV17 promoted lipid peroxides accumulation in the mitochondria of cardiomyocytes treated with FAC (
Figure 3D–F). These results illustrated that MPV17 prevented mitochondrial lipid peroxides accumulation in cardiomyocytes administrated with FAC. Next, we detected the impact of iron overload on mitochondrial respiratory chain. FAC treatment significantly disturbed the activity of mitochondrial respiratory chain (Complex I-V) while overexpression of MPV17 partially recovered the activity of mitochondrial respiratory chain (
Figure 3G–K). Although mitochondrial Fe2+ levels were significantly increased detected by the mito-FerroGreen staining after the treatment of FAC, overexpression of MPV17 did not influence the mitochondrial Fe2+ levels (
Supplementary Figure S1). Then, we detected its impact on the maintenance of mitochondrial redox homeostasis. mtGSH has been confirmed to play an essential role in preventing ferroptosis initiation
28. We found that FAC treatment decreased the levels of mtGSH while overexpression of MPV17 partially recovered mtGSH levels (
Figure 2N). Knockdown of MPV17 promoted the exhaustion of mtGSH in cardiomyocytes treated with FAC (
Figure 3O). mtGSH was not only an anti-oxidant reagent but also essential for mitochondrial protein glutathionylation which protected proteins from oxidative damage under oxidative stress. We found that mitochondrial protein glutathionylation increased slightly in cardiomyocytes treated with FAC while overexpression of MPV17 further promoted mitochondrial protein glutathionylation. Interestingly, the core enzymes of mitochondrial respiratory chain, NADPH oxidase 4 (nox4) and cytochrome c oxidase 1 (cox1) were also glutathionylated, which were further promoted by MPV17 overexpression. The glutathionylation of nox4 and cox1 protected them from oxidative damages and explained the recovery of mitochondrial respiratory chain activity after MPV17 overexpression. To further confirmed the role of mtGSH in iron-overload induced ferroptosis, we pre-treated the cardiomyocytes with GSH for 6 hours. We found that GSH treatment prevented iron overload-induced ferroptosis and simultaneous overexpression of a mitochondrial GPX4 (mtGPX4) further reduced myocardial ferroptosis (
Figure 3M). However, simultaneous overexpression of MPV17 was not as pronounced as simultaneous overexpression of mtGPX4 in the reduction of ferroptosis in cardiomyocytes treated with GSH (
Figure 3M). These results indicated that MPV17 functioned upstream of the GSH/GPX4 signaling. In conclusion, iron overload decreased mtGSH which led to mitochondrial lipid peroxides accumulation and mitochondrial respiratory chain dysfunction. MPV17 attenuated iron overload-induced myocardial ferroptosis through maintaining the mtGSH levels.