*2.3. mtDNA Characterization*

Whole DNA was prepared from total blood, kidney and urine sediment samples with the DNA extraction kit from Qiagen (Hilden, Germany), and mtDNA was amplified as described in [16]. The revised Cambridge reference sequence (rCRS) of *H. sapiens* mitochondrial DNA (GenBank NC\_012920.1) was used to identify variants of this DNA. Variant prioritization and the presence of deletion/depletion was performed as described [16]. The abundance of mutations was assessed using a Pyromark Q24 platform (Qiagen) as described in [16]. After purification using streptavidin Sepharose HP (GE Healthcare), and denaturation with NaOH, the PCR products were annealed and sequenced with the primers listed in Table 1.


**Table 1.** Primers used for PCR amplification of mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) and sequencing.
