Autophagy: process and function

  1. Noboru Mizushima1
  1. Department of Physiology and Cell Biology, Tokyo Medical and Dental University, Tokyo 113-8519, Japan; Solution Oriented Research for Science and Technology, Japan Science and Technology Agency, Tokyo 102-0075, Japan

Abstract

Autophagy is an intracellular degradation system that delivers cytoplasmic constituents to the lysosome. Despite its simplicity, recent progress has demonstrated that autophagy plays a wide variety of physiological and pathophysiological roles, which are sometimes complex. Autophagy consists of several sequential steps—sequestration, transport to lysosomes, degradation, and utilization of degradation products—and each step may exert different function. In this review, the process of autophagy is summarized, and the role of autophagy is discussed in a process-based manner.

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