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Selective autophagy

Mohammad Omar Faruk^1,2, Yoshinobu Ichimura¹, Masaaki Komatsu¹

¹Department of Physiology, Juntendo University Graduate School of Medicine, Bunkyo-ku, Japan.

|August 18, 2021

Abstract:

While starvation-induced autophagy is thought to randomly degrade cellular components, under certain circumstances autophagy selectively recognizes, sequesters, and degrades specific targets via autophagosomes. This process is called selective autophagy, and it contributes to cellular homeostasis by degrading specific soluble proteins, supramolecular complexes, liquid-liquid phase-separated droplets, abnormal or excess organelles, and pathogenic invasive bacteria. This means that autophagy, like the ubiquitin-proteasome system, strictly regulates diverse cellular functions through its selectivity. In this short review, we focus on the mechanism of "selective" autophagy, which is rapidly being elucidated.

Keywords:

ATG8-family proteins autophagy liquid-liquid phase separation selective autophagy selective autophagy receptors

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Autophagy is a self-digesting process by which a cell protects itself from threats both within and outside the cell, ranging from abnormal proteins to invading bacteria. In this process, obsolete components of the cell and invading microbes are degraded by hydrolytic enzymes active in an acidic environment of the lysosomal lumen.
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Delivery Pathways to the Lysosome

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Eukaryotic cells use different mechanisms to eliminate toxic waste obsolete and worn-out substances. Lysosomes play a pivotal role in this, and hence, these substances are carried to the lysosome from other parts of the cell and extracellular space through different pathways. The most elaborately studied pathways to the lysosome are the endocytic pathways.
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Autophagic Cell Death

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The Proteasome

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The Proteasome

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Regulated Protein Degradation

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