bims-raghud 2024-09-01 papers

Issue of 2024–09–01
two papers selected by
Irene Sambri, TIGEM

Nephron. 2024 Aug 23.

Lipophagy and mitophagy in renal pathophysiology.

BACKGROUND: The lysosomal autophagic pathway plays a fundamental role in cellular and tissue homeostasis, its deregulation is linked to human pathologies including kidney diseases. Autophagy can randomly degrade cytoplasmic components in a non-selective manner commonly referred to as bulk autophagy. In contrast, selective forms of autophagy specifically target cytoplasmic structures such as organelles and protein aggregates thereby being important for cellular quality control and organelle homeostasis.
SUMMARY: Research during the past decades has begun to elucidate the role of selective autophagy in kidney physiology and kidney diseases.
KEY MESSAGES: In this review, we will summarize the knowledge on lipophagy and mitophagy, two forms of selective autophagy important in renal epithelium homeostasis and discuss how their deregulations contribute to renal disease progression.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1159/000540688

Nat Cardiovasc Res. 2024 May;3(5): 500-514

Mitochondrial calcium uniporter channel gatekeeping in cardiovascular disease.

Tyler L Stevens, Henry M Cohen, Joanne F Garbincius, John W Elrod.

The mitochondrial calcium (mCa2+) uniporter channel (mtCU) resides at the inner mitochondrial membrane and is required for Ca2+ to enter the mitochondrial matrix. The mtCU is essential for cellular function, as mCa2+ regulates metabolism, bioenergetics, signaling pathways and cell death. mCa2+ uptake is primarily regulated by the MICU family (MICU1, MICU2, MICU3), EF-hand-containing Ca2+-sensing proteins, which respond to cytosolic Ca2+ concentrations to modulate mtCU activity. Considering that mitochondrial function and Ca2+ signaling are ubiquitously disrupted in cardiovascular disease, mtCU function has been a hot area of investigation for the last decade. Here we provide an in-depth review of MICU-mediated regulation of mtCU structure and function, as well as potential mtCU-independent functions of these proteins. We detail their role in cardiac physiology and cardiovascular disease by highlighting the phenotypes of different mutant animal models, with an emphasis on therapeutic potential and targets of interest in this pathway.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s44161-024-00463-7