Debnath Jayanta, Baehrecke Eric H, Kroemer Guido
Department of Pathology, University of California San Francisco, San Francisco, California, USA.
Autophagy. 2005 Jul;1(2):66-74. doi: 10.4161/auto.1.2.1738. Epub 2005 Jul 13.
Autophagy (specifically macroautophagy) is an evolutionarily conserved catabolic process where the cytoplasmic contents of a cell are sequestered within double membrane vacuoles, called autophagosomes, and subsequently delivered to the lysosome for degradation. Autophagy can function as a survival mechanism in starving cells. At the same time, extensive autophagy is commonly observed in dying cells, leading to its classification as an alternative form of programmed cell death. The functional contribution of autophagy to cell death has been a subject of great controversy. However, several recent loss-of-function studies of autophagy (atg) genes have begun to address the roles of autophagy in both cell death and survival. Here, we review the emerging evidence in favor of and against autophagic cell death, discuss the possible roles that autophagic degradation might play in dying cells, and identify salient issues for future investigation.
自噬（特别是巨自噬）是一种进化上保守的分解代谢过程，细胞的胞质内容物被隔离在称为自噬体的双膜液泡中，随后被运送到溶酶体进行降解。自噬可作为饥饿细胞中的一种存活机制。同时，在濒死细胞中普遍观察到广泛的自噬，导致其被归类为程序性细胞死亡的一种替代形式。自噬对细胞死亡的功能贡献一直是一个极具争议的话题。然而，最近几项关于自噬（atg）基因的功能丧失研究已开始探讨自噬在细胞死亡和存活中的作用。在此，我们综述支持和反对自噬性细胞死亡的新证据，讨论自噬降解在濒死细胞中可能发挥的作用，并确定未来研究的突出问题。
