Recent Posts

Review. Autophagy: A key player in the recovery of plants from heat stress

Plants have a remarkable ability to adapt to stress. For many stresses, plants respond to short-term mild exposure by becoming more tolerant to subsequent harsher stresses that would otherwise be lethal; this effect is known as priming. Priming occurs through several mechanisms that can include changes…

Autophagy regulation by HLS1-mediated acetylation

Huang et al. explore the molecular mechanism underlying the regulation of autophagy by HLS1.  https://doi.org/10.1093/plcell/koad252  By Li Huang, Xing Wen, Lian Jin, Huihui Han, and Hongwei Guo New Cornerstone Science Laboratory, Institute of Plant and Food Science, Department of Biology,…

Selective autophagy of THOUSAND GRAIN WEIGHT 6 protein

Rice is a globally important crop, therefore increasing yield without compromising quality is of much interest. A reduction in the amount of the TGW6 (THOUSAND-GRAIN WEIGHT 6) protein is associated with improved grain yield and quality in rice. However, we do not fully understand how TGW6 protein levels…

Discovering autophagy protein cargo by protein turnover analysis in Arabidopsis

Li et al. explore the nature of proteins that accumulate in mutants deficient in autophagy machinery. Plant Cell Lei Li1,2 and A. Harvey Millar2 Frontiers Science Center for Cell Responses, Department of Plant Biology and Ecology, College of Life Sciences, Nankai University, 300071 Tianjin,…

Autophagy promotes photomorphogenesis during seedling development (bioRxiv)

Autophagy is an intracellular evolutionarily conserved catabolic process that degrades cytoplasmic constituents and organelles in lytic vacuoles (micro- and macro-autophagy) or in the cytosol (mega-autophagy). Autophagy can be induced by biotic or abiotic stresses, sugar, carbon and nutrient starvation…

A clustered mitochondria family protein mediates the plant mitophagy (Curr. Biol.)

Mitochondria function as cellular powerhouses to generate energy via oxidative phosphorylation and facilitate the synthesis of essential macromolecules. To protect against proteotoxic stress, damaged mitochondria are selectively removed by autophagy via a process known as mitophagy. In mammalian cells,…

Exo70B2 functions as a exocyst subunit in secretion linked to immunity and autophagy (Plant Cell)

The exocyst is a conserved protein complex that mediates tethering of secretory vesicle to the plasma membrane prior to SNARE-mediated membrane fusion. Exo70 is one of eight subunits and has expanded into 23 homologs in Arabidopsis. Brillada and Teh et al. identified Exo70B2 as a bona fide exocyst subunit…

Persulfidation of ATG4 negatively regulates autophagy

Ana M. Laureano-Marín, Ángeles Aroca, et al. explore the role of persulfidation in the regulation of autophagy. Plant Cell https://doi.org/10.1105/tpc.20.00766  by Cecilia Gotor, Ana M. Laureano-Marín, Ángeles Aroca Instituto de Bioquímica Vegetal y Fotosíntesis, Consejo Superior de Investigaciones…

How to Eat One’s Feelings: Autophagy and Phosphatidylinositol 3-Phosphate

Moving around taught me two essential skills, only one being relevant here: how to put up wallpaper, and how critical it is to label boxes to help the moving company drop them at their intended location. Now think of a cell: the boxes are vesicles, their contents are proteins and metabolites, and the…