A brief history of autophagy from cell biology to physiology and disease

Noboru Mizushima

doi:10.1038/s41556-018-0092-5

A brief history of autophagy from cell biology to physiology and disease

Nat Cell Biol. 2018 May;20(5):521-527. doi: 10.1038/s41556-018-0092-5. Epub 2018 Apr 23.

Author

Noboru Mizushima¹

Affiliation

¹ Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Graduate School and Faculty of Medicine, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan. nmizu@m.u-tokyo.ac.jp.

PMID: 29686264
DOI: 10.1038/s41556-018-0092-5

Abstract

The field of autophagy research has developed rapidly since the first description of the process in the 1960s and the identification of autophagy genes in the 1990s. Autophagy is now increasingly studied at the level of organismal pathophysiology and is being connected to the medical sciences. This Historical Perspective describes a brief history of autophagy and discusses unanswered cell biological questions in the field.

Publication types

Historical Article
Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
Review

MeSH terms

Animals
Autophagy* / genetics
Autophagy-Related Proteins / genetics
Autophagy-Related Proteins / metabolism
Biomedical Research / history*
Biomedical Research / trends
Cell Biology / history*
Cell Biology / trends
Disease / history
History, 19th Century
History, 20th Century
History, 21st Century
Homeostasis
Humans
Signal Transduction
Terminology as Topic

Substances

Autophagy-Related Proteins