Mitodicure GmbH - Research into ME/CFS treatments

Perrier said:
For a layman like myself it does look very rational and seems to explain all the symptoms that appear. Would be grateful to hear what others think.
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These hypotheses can look interesting to begin with.

By the time you've heard seven more that are equally compelling but mutually exclusive, you're a lot more sceptical. People cherrypick findings, stressing those that align with their pet theory and conveniently ignoring those that either don't add up or actually contradict it.

I'm sure they believe in them sincerely, but belief is so unhelpful in science that starting to develop symptoms of it should probably sound a loud hooter with flashing red lights.
 
www.laborjournal.de

Mitodicure entwickelt Medikament gegen ME/CFS

Das Start-up Mitodicure um die früheren Sanofi-Mitarbeiter Klaus Wirth und Harald Pacl arbeitet an einem neuartigen Wirkstoff gegen ME/CFS. Ziel ist die erste zugelassene Therapie für die häufi ...
www.laborjournal.de

The company's drug candidate is currently in preclinical phase. "We have completed the pharmacology and are now starting the usual toxicity and safety studies," says Pacl. [...] The Mitodicure founders' current plan is to bring their candidate to clinical proof of concept, i.e., a completed Phase 2a study.
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The private start-up receives the funding for this from what Pacl calls traditional sources. "We are currently financing ourselves privately as well as with funds from the state of Hesse and the European Union. A mix of private and public funds from the federal government will also be necessary for the next larger financing round. Otherwise, we are not moving fast enough." The next step, however, is seed financing, which the founders hope to achieve through venture capitalists and wealthy private individuals.
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From LinkedIn:

A study from the University of Erlangen on post-COVID-19 patients (83 % of whom met the Canadian criteria for ME/CFS), using non-invasive near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) to measure oxygenated hemoglobin, demonstrated changes in oxygenation during skeletal muscle activity that indicate hypoperfusion, mitochondrial dysfunction, and impaired oxygen diffusion in muscle:
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Ladek et al., 2025 – “Deoxygenation Trends and Their Multivariate Association with Self-Reported Fatigue in Post-COVID Syndrome”, Biomedicines
https://www.mdpi.com/2227-9059/13/6/1371
DOI: 10.3390/biomedicines13061371
An advantage of this hand muscle exercise test is that it is non-invasive and does not trigger PEM.
This study and the two studies from Harvard and Stanford highlighted in our previous post support one another and are consistent with findings and conclusions from exercise and muscle studies conducted in Amsterdam, Ulm, and Arizona:
  • Amsterdam: Skeletal muscle properties in long COVID and ME/CFS differ from those induced by bed rest (Appelman et al., preprint, 2025)
    https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.05.02.25326885v1
  • Ulm: Bizjak et al., 2024 – skeletal muscle / exercise physiology findings in ME/CFS and post-COVID patients (University of Ulm)
  • Arizona: Jothi et al., 2025 – muscle oxygenation / exercise response abnormalities in post-COVID and ME/CFS patients
The parameters identified in the Erlangen and Stanford studies meet the standards of scientific biomarkers and hold promise as future diagnostic biomarkers.
Taken together, the skeletal muscle pathophysiology on which Mitodicure’s targeted and rational drug approach is based is now strongly supported by these and other studies. The time for drug development is overdue.
 
From LinkedIn:

A newly published study examines retinal vasculature in patients with post-COVID syndrome (PCS) and ME/CFS.

www.medrxiv.org

Microvascular Remodeling and Endothelial Dysfunction Across Post-COVID-19 and ME/CFS: Insights from the All Eyes on PCS Study

Background Post-viral diseases, including post-COVID-19 syndrome (PCS) and myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS), cause substantial long-term morbidity. Persistent cardiovascular (CV) risk after acute infection highlights the need for accessible tools to quantify...
www.medrxiv.org www.medrxiv.org
The study shows both structural and functional microvascular alterations that correlate with clinical symptoms and inflammatory markers. Notably, retinal microvascular abnormalities were more pronounced in patients with ME/CFS than in those with PCS who did not meet ME/CFS criteria. Retinal vessel analysis offers a non-invasive window into the body's microvascular system, particularly cerebral microcirculation. The findings provide a plausible explanation for neurocognitive dysfunction and align with previous research demonstrating reduced cerebral blood flow and impaired neurovascular coupling. They are also consistent with a recent MRI study reporting impaired brain energy metabolism in affected patients.

In addition to stimulating ion transporters in skeletal muscle, Mitodicure's investigational drug MDC002 has the potential to enhance tissue perfusion
 
Muscle weakness in severe ME/CFS: Sodium-potassium pump hypothesis

Muscle weakness in severe ME/CFS: Sodium-potassium pump hypothesis

Article overview: A recent paper proposed that muscle weakness in severe ME/CFS may be driven by dysfunction of the sodium-potassium pump in skeletal muscle cells. The authors argue that this could disrupt cellular electrical signalling and cause sodium and calcium overload, which in turn...
www.meresearch.org.uk www.meresearch.org.uk
 
www.linkedin.com

#mecfs #mitodicure | Mitodicure GmbH

A highly interesting publication from Prof. Simon’s research group in Mainz, Germany focuses on #MECFS: https://lnkd.in/dvkhASk9 As in previous CPET studies, numerous parameters revealed an impaired energy supply in the musculature, which is also the therapeutic target organ of the compound...
www.linkedin.com www.linkedin.com
 
This is the start:
Among a variety of symptoms, many ME/CFS patients suffer from manifestations and symptoms of disturbed connective tissue. Marfan-syndrome and hypermobile Ehlers-Danlos-Syndrome (hEDS) are well established co-morbidities or risk factors for ME/CFS (van Dijk et al., 2008), (Roma et al., 2018), (Rowe et al., 1999), (Hakim et al., 2017).
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Compared with the healthy volunteers significantly more patients with ME/CFS fulfilled the criteria for generalized joint hypermobility (Nijs et al., 2006),(Bragée et al., 2020). Joint hypermobility was found more common in children with chronic fatigue syndrome than in healthy controls (Barron et al., 2002).
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Both generalized joint hypermobility and extreme hypermobility were reported to be significant risk factors for long COVID or associated with it (Ganesh & Munipalli, 2024), (Torok et al., 2025).
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Patients show cervical instability, hypermobile joints, stretchy skin, and orthostatic intolerance (van Dijk et al., 2008), (Roma et al., 2018), (Rowe et al., 1999), (Hakim et al., 2017), (Rowe et al., 2017), (van Campen et al., 2020), (Ganesh & Munipalli, 2024).
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ME/CFS with concurrent joint hypermobility and EDS was associated with more severe symptoms and greater functional impairment (Mudie et al., 2024). In that study, 15.5% of ME/CFS patients were classified as having joint hypermobility.
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Other studies have reported prevalences of joint hypermobility approaching 20% (Nijs et al., 2006), (van Campen et al., 2021). Notably, van Campen et al. found that hypermobile patients exhibited significantly higher rates of postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome (POTS) during tilt-table testing compared to non-hypermobile patients. In contrast, Bragée et al. ((Bragée et al., 2020) reported a substantially higher prevalence of approximately 50%.
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Utsikt said:
This is the start:
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Yes, there are lots of studies that do not have a sound epidemiological framework.
The ones that do, including surveys of children in Scandinavia, show nothing much in terms of relation of hypermobility to widespread pain or fatigue.

I have never heard of a link to Marfan syndrome before.

Ganesh and Munipalli is a word salad review that i suspect contains no new data. Roma is just another rehash review. Hakim was a trainee of mine and an protegé of Rodney Graham. I have not seen any reliable data from him. And so on.
 
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