Research indicates that DMT1 is critical in the progression of osteoarthritis (OA) driven by iron overload; inhibiting DMT1 alleviates IL-1β-induced inflammatory responses and extracellular matrix degradation by significantly suppressing the MAPK and PI3K/AKT/NF-κB signaling pathways (Liu et al., 2024). Here, SLC11A2 is linked to osteoarthritis.