Columbia University mitochondria researcher Martin Picard’s life changed in 2014 when he peered through a microscope in Douglas Wallace’s lab at the Children’s Hospital Philadelphia. He saw something that didn’t fit the textbook “powerhouse of the cell” picture. Mitochondria are tiny elongated and sometimes spherical energy-producing organelles. While many times thinner in diameter than a human hair, hundreds to thousands of mitochondria populate the interior of each human cell.

After 20 years of wonder, Picard’s personal and professional journey was picked up by Scientific American, which has just published his article, The Social Lives of Mitochondria: When These Energy-Giving Organelles Thrive, So Do We (Scientific American June 2025). The online version of the print article, viewed here, is entitled Mitochondria Are More Than Powerhouses—They’re the Motherboard of the Cell.

Picard writes, “Under the high-power microscope, mitochondria have many tiny generally horizontal “baffles”, called cristae, the site of ATP production, the cellular energy currency. Energy transformation within cristae involves the stripping of electrons from food and allows them to flow onto the oxygen we breathe”.

With hundreds to thousands of mitochondria bunched together, it is hard to know if they are acting in concert or as random lone operators. What Picard saw through the microscope, featured here and below was the alignment of the cristae between mitochondria. “The first physical evidence of non-molecular information exchange between mitochondria,” says Picard.

Mitochondria microscopy

https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms7259/figures/3

 

Since then, Picard and others have probed this mitochondrial behavior to the point that it appears mitochondria are operating communally or failing to do so. Different organs, researchers have found, have different types of mitochondria. “Mitochondria have a bacterial origin in evolution, and there is ample evidence from bacteria today that they do what is called “quorum sensing” where they signal and align to perform tasks a single bacterium or mitochondrion could not accomplish on its own,” Picard explains.

For more background and context, MitoWorld talked with Picard:

MitoWorld: Can you show us any microscopy or artistic renditions or video that shows the “social” nature of mitochondria?

Picard: The best video is this. Also this video showing cristae align between mitos changed my life. This picture shows mitochondria networking.

MitoWorld: What led to your thoughts about the social nature of mitochondria? 

Picard: Everything in biology has somewhat of an interactive nature to it. And across the universe, everything is interconnected, from electrostatically attracted protons and electrons within atoms, to attracted social human beings, to planets attracted to each other by gravitational forces. Why would our biology be different? And could there be some kind of “social” behavior deep within our cells that led to our organs, bodies, and to our mind to becoming “social”. And it could have started with the endosymbiosis of mitochondria.

MitoWorld: Has this been on your mind for a while, how did you begin to verify the social conjecture? 

Picard: Early work by David Chan on mitochondrial fusion. In 2012 I wrote a piece called “Mitochondria: Starving to Reach Quorum” that touched on their “social” nature, like bacteria that talk to each other to do “quorum sensing” and increase their virulence. Then in 2014, I saw cristae alignment between mitochondria. Since then, many labs have observed that, if you prevent mito-mito interactions (disrupt their social interactions), they go bad, as do the cells that house them too. My neuroscientist colleague Carmen Sandi and I detailed this in a paper in 2021.

MitoWorld: Help readers understand how important mitochondria are to the life of cells.

Picard: Without mitochondria, we would not exist. When they appeared in evolution, the result of a merger. This was the click—the beginning of a new phase of life. Somehow their presence allowed a type of multicellular life that wasn’t possible before. My hunch is that mitochondria provided the ability to process information: they made cells smarter and elevated their “social” behavior to a next level. With this, cells could come together into larger collectives, hold larger goals, and grow organisms that behave, think, and feel. This may all have been possible because the Mitochondrial Information Processing System (MIPS) became the “brain” of the cell.

MitoWorld: What are the behaviors of mitochondria that are “social”?

Picard: Mitochondria 1) communicate with each other and other organelles, 2) exhibit group formation, 3) are interdependent, 4) synchronize their behaviors, and 5) functionally specialize to accomplish specific functions.

MitoWorld: What are the health, medical and research avenues that open as a result of the mounting evidence of the social nature of mitochondria?

Picard: I think it’s time to see ourselves energetically. We are not just molecular machines. That mechanical, somewhat static view has been propagated for too long without seeing the wider energetic context. Understanding the “social” layer of biological organization makes it clear that there are biological processes and forces, including “goals” that cells and organisms have, that aren’t just the product of cogwheels. For example, the healing process is a completely untapped area of medicine and science that needs attention. I would suggest that, alongside our mitochondrial research, we need Healing Science, a new area of science that will map out how we manage to heal, every day. Charting this new territory of health and healing science has to be grounded in first principles. The interconnectedness of our biology, together with our fundamental energetic nature, are those first principles. Realizing that mitochondria are “social” is a step towards a more accurate view of how life works, and of what keeps us healthy day after day.