Autophagy regulation and viral exploitation: insights into African swine fever virus pathogenesis

African swine fever virus (ASFV), a devastating pathogen of swine, poses a great threat to the global pork industry and food supply due to its high lethality and lack of effective countermeasures. In this review, we aim to elucidate the intricate interplay between ASFV and host autophagy-a cellular process with dual roles in viral pathogenesis. By dissecting the molecular mechanisms through which ASFV interacts with autophagy, this review resolves key controversies surrounding autophagy's context-dependent effects on viral replication, immune evasion, and tissue damage. The significance of this work lies in its potential to bridge current knowledge gaps by unraveling how autophagy-modulating viral proteins dictate divergent outcomes in infection, identifying novel therapeutic targets to counteract ASFV immune evasion strategies, and providing a framework for understanding host-pathogen conflicts in large DNA virus infections. Overall, we hope that proposing autophagy-targeted interventions could act as a paradigm shift in developing urgently needed antiviral strategies against ASFV.