Journal
JOURNAL OF CELL BIOLOGY
Volume 201, Issue 4, Pages 531-539Publisher
ROCKEFELLER UNIV PRESS
DOI: 10.1083/jcb.201211160
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Funding
- Wellcome Trust [087518/Z/08/Z]
- Hungarian Scientific Research Fund [K83509]
- Hungarian Academy of Sciences [BO/00552/11]
- Wellcome Trust [087518/Z/08/Z] Funding Source: Wellcome Trust
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During autophagy, phagophores capture portions of cytoplasm and form double-membrane autophagosomes to deliver cargo for lysosomal degradation. How autophagosomes gain competence to fuse with late endosomes and lysosomes is not known. In this paper, we show that Syntaxin17 is recruited to the outer membrane of autophagosomes to mediate fusion through its interactions with ubisnap (SNAP-29) and VAMP7 in Drosophila melanogaster. Loss of these genes results in accumulation of autophagosomes and a block of autolysosomal degradation during basal, starvation-induced, and developmental autophagy. Viable Syntaxin17 mutant adults show large-scale accumulation of autophagosomes in neurons, severe locomotion defects, and premature death. These mutant phenotypes cannot be rescued by neuron-specific inhibition of caspases, suggesting that caspase activation and cell death do not play a major role in brain dysfunction. Our findings reveal the molecular mechanism underlying autophagosomal fusion events and show that lysosomal degradation and re-cycling of sequestered autophagosome content is crucial to maintain proper functioning of the nervous system.
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