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Protein breakdown

Ubiquitous déjà vu

Nature volume 395, pages 321–323 (1998)Cite this article

How miserable must life get before one is ready to eat parts of one's own body? Most humans would probably rather starve to death. But nucleated cells are sometimes forced to gather food from their own interior in a process known as autophagy1, to provide the nutrients needed to keep their vital functions running. However, severe starvation is only one of the factors that can trigger this grisly feast. Autophagy is also one of the main ways for a cell to get rid of obsolete parts, including aged proteins from the cytoplasm and even complete organelles. In busy cells such as those in the liver, for example, the mitochondria that produce chemical energy wear out rapidly and are subsequently digested by autophagy. For obvious reasons, autophagy must be strictly controlled, yet surprisingly few studies have addressed this problem. Now, however, on page 395 of this issue, Mizushima et al.2 report the discovery of an intriguing protein-modification pathway that is required for autophagy. This pathway seems to be conserved from yeast to mammals, and may point to a general principle of protein targeting by covalent modification.

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Figure 1: Enzymatic pathways related to the ubiquitin system.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. the Center for Molecular Biology (ZMBH), Heidelberg University, Im Neuenheimer Feld 282, Heidelberg, 69120, Germany

    Stefan Jentsch & Helle D. Ulrich

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  1. Stefan Jentsch
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  2. Helle D. Ulrich
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Jentsch, S., Ulrich, H. Ubiquitous déjà vu. Nature 395, 321–323 (1998). https://doi.org/10.1038/26335

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