Human mitoNEET (mNT) is the first identified Fe-S protein of the mammalian outer mitochondrial membrane. Recently, mNT has been implicated in cytosolic Fe-S repair of a key regulator of cellular iron homeostasis. Here, we aimed to decipher the mechanism by which mNT triggers its Fe-S repair capacity. By using tightly controlled reactions combined with complementary spectroscopic approaches, we have determined the differential roles played by both the redox state of the mNT cluster and dioxygen in cluster transfer and protein stability. We unambiguously demonstrated that only the oxidized state of the mNT cluster triggers cluster transfer to a generic acceptor protein and that dioxygen is neither required for the cluster transfer reaction nor does it affect the transfer rate. In the absence of apo-acceptors, a large fraction of the oxidized holo-mNT form is converted back to reduced holo-mNT under low oxygen tension. Reduced holo-mNT, which holds a [2Fe-2S] ؉ with a global protein fold similar to that of the oxidized form is, by contrast, resistant in losing its cluster or in transferring it. Our findings thus demonstrate that mNT uses an iron-based redox switch mechanism to regulate the transfer of its cluster. The oxidized state is the "active state," which reacts promptly to initiate Fe-S transfer independently of dioxygen, whereas the reduced state is a "dormant form." Finally, we propose that the redox-sensing function of mNT is a key component of the cellular adaptive response to help stress-sensitive Fe-S proteins recover from oxidative injury.MitoNEET (mNT) 5 is an Fe-S protein of the mammalian outer mitochondrial membrane previously identified as a target of the type II diabetes drug pioglitazone (1). This 13-kDa protein is anchored to the outer mitochondrial membrane by its 32-amino acid N terminus with the major part of the protein, including the C-terminal [2Fe-2S] binding domain, located in the cytosol (2). In vivo, the biological activity of mNT has been linked to the regulation of iron/reactive oxygen species homeostasis in vivo (3, 4) to cell proliferation in human breast cancer (5) and to the regulation of lipid and glucose metabolism (4).Crystallographic studies of the soluble form of mNT (mNT ) revealed that the protein dimerizes and accommodates one [2Fe-2S] cluster per monomer coordinated by three cysteines (Cys-72, Cys-74, and Cys-83) and one histidine (His-87) in a CDGSH domain (6 -9). The cluster is redox-active with a midpoint redox potential of roughly 0 mV at pH 7 (10), and its lability depends on its redox state and on the pH (9, 11). mNT is also able to transfer its cluster in vitro to a cyanobacterial (12) and Escherichia coli apoferredoxin or to human ironregulatory protein-1 (IRP-1)/cytosolic aconitase (13). Recently, it has been proposed that mNT plays a specific role in cytosolic Fe-S cluster repair of IRP-1, a key regulator of cellular iron homeostasis in mammalian cells (13).It has been pointed out previously (12) that oxidation of the mNT cluster is necessary to trigger Fe-S ...