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Autophagy is a catabolic process through which cells replenish their macromolecular stores in response to nutrient deficiency, and also maintain homeostatic health and survival by degrading damaged proteins and organelles. Autophagy has emerged as a fundamental and conserved cellular mechanism with complex roles in health and disease. Nature Cell Biology presents a series of specially commissioned articles that will discuss recent advances and outstanding questions driving this expanding and diverse field. An accompanying online library contains research and Review articles on this topic published in the past two years by Nature Cell Biology and the Nature journals.
A history of autophagy. In this Perspective, Mizushima describes the leaps and bounds in the history of autophagy and discusses unanswered questions driving the field forward.
In this Review Article, Klionsky and co-authors discuss selective autophagy pathways that degrade unwanted cytosolic components and organelles, and how these pathways require ligand receptors and scaffold proteins for cargo specificity.
Autophagy and cancer: In this Review, Galluzzi and colleagues discuss the cellular and molecular mechanisms whereby autophagy functions in multiple aspects of malignant disease, including cancer initiation, progression and responses to therapy.
In this Review, Tavernarakis and colleagues describe recent advances in delineating the molecular mechanisms that mediate mitophagy, and discuss the complex roles of this pathway in physiological and pathological contexts.
In this Review, Doherty and Baehrecke discuss the multiple roles of autophagy during cell survival and cell death. They cover the interplay between autophagy, apoptosis and necrosis, as well as engulfment and inflammation.
In this Review, Leidal et al. discuss the role and regulation of autophagy in aging. They cover how autophagy promotes longevity and restricts cellular damage, and discuss autophagy modulators for the potential treatment of age-related diseases.