title: Autophagy in neurodegeneration: two sides of the same coin.
abstract: Autophagy is a bulk lysosomal degradation process important in development, differentiation and cellular homeostasis in multiple organs. Interestingly, neuronal survival is highly dependent on autophagy due to its post-mitotic nature, polarized morphology and active protein trafficking. A growing body of evidence now suggests that alteration or dysfunction of autophagy causes accumulation of abnormal proteins and/or damaged organelles, thereby leading to neurodegenerative disease. Although autophagy generally prevents neuronal cell death, it plays a protective or detrimental role in neurodegenerative disease depending on the environment. In this review, the two sides of autophagy will be discussed in the context of several neurodegenerative diseases.
authors: College of Life Science and Nano Technology, Department of Biotechnology, Hannam University, Daejeon 305-811, Korea leeja@hnu.kr
authors: Jin-A
authors: JA
authors: Lee
mesh_terms: D001343:Autophagy / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D008954:Models, Biological; D009410:Nerve Degeneration / Q000209:etiology* / Q000473:pathology; D019636:Neurodegenerative Diseases / Q000209:etiology / Q000473:pathology; D015398:Signal Transduction / Q000502:physiology