The autophagy connection

Abstract

For a process intimately connected to an immense range of physiological processes, the molecular understanding of macroautophagy remains far from complete. Recent large-scale studies, including those of Behrends et al. in Nature and Lipinski et al. in Developmental Cell, are now providing new insight into the machinery of autophagy regulation.

Figure 1. Macroautophagy is extensively involved in cellular homeostasis

The morphological features of macroautophagy are illustrated schematically. The initial sequestering compartment, the phagophore, expands into the double-membrane autophagosome. Fusion with an endosome generates the single-membrane amphisome, which subsequently fuses with a lysosome. The degraded cytoplasm is released back into the cytosol through permeases. Some of the physiological connections between macroautophagy and human health and disease are indicated by the surrounding terms.