Effect of lutein on worms lacking complex I subunit nuo-5 (ortholog of human NDUFS1)

To gain insight into the pathways accounting for the deleterious effects associated with severe mitochondrial dysfunction, we compared the transcriptomic profile in control L3 larvae with that of strong (arrested) nuo-5 RNAi. We also found that the natural compound lutein was able to rescue some of the defective phenotypes we characterized in nuo-5-depleted animals therefore we compared also the transcriptomic profile of stage-matched (L3) cohorts of C. elegans upon strong nuo-5 RNAi, treated and untreated with lutein, with that of animals fed empty vector control. Three different groups were analyzed, each containing 4 independent samples