Introduction. Autophagy dysregulation in neuropathology.

摘要

Since the late 1960s, neuropathologists have recognized structural changes related to alterations inautophagy and the lysosomal degradation system in multiple diseases of the nervous system. Indeed, these changes seemed so ubiquitous that for many years they were relegated to the bucket of "non-specific injury responses." With the advent of specific molecular tools to track and manipulate autoph-agy (4), it has become clear that perturbations in autophagy are frequently observed in diseases of the nervous system and muscle because of its essential physiological roles in these tissues (3,5-7). Autophagy dysregulation has been described in neurons, myofibers, astrocytes, Schwann cells, oligodendrocytes and macrophage/ microglia, sometimes with interactions that adversely affect neuron health. Moreover, autophagy dysregulation actively contributes to disease pathogenesis as highlighted in this Mini-Symposium.