Seeking to understand why COVID-19 is able to suppress the body’s immune response, new research from the USC Leonard Davis School of Gerontology suggests that mitochondria are one of the first lines of defense against COVID-19 and identifies key differences in how SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, affects mitochondrial genes when compared to other viruses. These differences offer possible explanations as to why older adults and people with metabolic disfunction have more severe responses to COVID-19 than other individuals and they also provide a starting point for more targeted approaches that may help identify therapeutics, says senior author Pinchas Cohen, professor of gerontology, medicine and biological sciences and dean of the USC Leonard Davis School.