ReviewRedox biology2015
Border between natural product and drug: comparison of the related benzoquinones idebenone and coenzyme Q10.
Review in Redox biology, 2015. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 52 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
52 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 110 citations in OpenAlex.
- Clinical features of neuronal intranuclear inclusion disease with seizures: a systematic literature review.Frontiers in neurology · 2024Pooled it
- Secondary Metabolites from the Marine-Derived Fungus Aspergillus udagawae SFC20170619-M03 Exhibiting Disease Control Activity.The plant pathology journal · 2026Article
- Idebenone reduces oxidative stress and differentially improves chromatin integrity in dog and cat epididymal spermatozoa after slow freezing and vitrification.Veterinary research communications · 2026Article
- Machine Learning Accelerates Crystallization for Structure Determination.Angewandte Chemie (International ed. in English) · 2026Article
- Article
- Protective Effect of Idebenone Against UVB-Induced Photoaging in HaCaT Cells.Drug design, development and therapy · 2026Article
- Research Progress on Idebenone in Neurodegenerative Diseases.Aging medicine (Milton (N.S.W)) · 2025Review
- Effect of idebenone supplementation in a semen extender on boar spermatozoa quality during liquid storage.Veterinary world · 2025Article
- Idebenone: Clinical Potential Beyond Neurological Diseases.Drug design, development and therapy · 2025Review
- IT TAKES TWO TO TANGO: potential novel therapies for autosomal dominant optic atrophy.Frontiers in ophthalmology · 2025Review
- Advances on the Mechanisms and Therapeutic Strategies in Non-coding CGG Repeat Expansion Diseases.Molecular neurobiology · 2024Review
- Oxygen-Binding Sites of Enriched Gold Nanoclusters for Capturing Mitochondrial Reverse Electrons.Nano letters · 2024Article
- Cysteine sulfenylation contributes to liver fibrosis via the regulation of EphB2-mediated signaling.Cell death & disease · 2024Article
- A new approach to prevent radiation-induced xerostomia using intraglandular injection of mitochondria-boosting agents.BMC cancer · 2024Article
- Anti-Inflammatory Effects of Idebenone Attenuate LPS-Induced Systemic Inflammatory Diseases by Suppressing NF-κB Activation.Antioxidants (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Article
- Oxidative stress in the eye and its role in the pathophysiology of ocular diseases.Redox biology · 2023Review
- Article
- The Role of Citicoline and Coenzyme Q10 in Retinal Pathology.International journal of molecular sciences · 2023Review
- Protection of dystrophic muscle cells using Idebenone correlates with the interplay between calcium, oxidative stress and inflammation.International journal of experimental pathology · 2023Article
- CGG repeat expansion inProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
3 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Coenzyme Q10 is a ubiquitous component of cellular membranes and belongs to the class of benzoquinones that mainly differ with regards to the length and composition of their hydrophobic tail. The characteristic quinone group can accept electrons from various biological sources and is converted by a one electron transfer to the unstable semiquinone or by a two electron transfer to the more stable hydroquinone. This feature makes CoQ10 the bona fide cellular electron transfer molecule within the mitochondrial respiratory chain and also makes it a potent cellular antioxidant. These activities serve as justification for its popular use as food supplement. Another quinone with similarities to the naturally occurring CoQ10 is idebenone, which shares its quinone moiety with CoQ10, but at the same time differs from CoQ10 by the presence of a much shorter, less lipophilic tail. However, despite its similarity to CoQ10, idebenone cannot be isolated from any natural sources but instead was synthesized and selected as a pharmacologically active compound in the 1980s by Takeda Pharmaceuticals purely based on its pharmacological properties. Several recent clinical trials demonstrated some therapeutic efficacy of idebenone in different indications and as a consequence, many practitioners question if the freely available CoQ10 could not be used instead. Here, we describe the molecular and pharmacological features of both molecules that arise from their structural differences to answer the question if idebenone is merely a CoQ10 analogue as frequently perpetuated in the literature or a pharmaceutical drug with entirely different features.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.