The presence of the best-known oncogenic events in thyroid cancer, including BRAF, RAS, TP53 mutations, RET/PTC and PAX8/PPARγ rearrangements, was assessed in addition to a high-throughput mutation screening for the nuclear-encoded complex I subunits [27], which may account for those cases lacking mtDNA mutations. Here, PAX8 is linked to thyroid gland carcinoma.