title: Autophagy and bacterial infection: an evolving arms race.
abstract: Autophagy is an important membrane transport pathway that is conserved among eukaryotic cells. Although first described as an intracellular catabolic pathway used to break down self-components, autophagy has been found to play an important role in the elimination of intracellular pathogens. A variety of host mechanisms exist for recognizing and targeting intracellular bacteria to autophagosomes. Several intracellular bacteria have evolved ways to manipulate, inhibit, or avoid autophagy in order to survive in the cell. Thus, the autophagy pathway can be viewed as an evolutionarily conserved host response to infection.
authors.affiliation: Department of Microbial Pathogenesis, Yale University School of Medicine, 295 Congress Avenue, New Haven, CT 06536, USA.
authors.forename: Augustine
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Choy
authors.forename: Craig R
authors.initials: CR
authors.lastname: Roy
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001343:Autophagy; D001424:Bacterial Infections / Q000235:genetics / Q000382:microbiology / Q000503:physiopathology*; D018407:Bacterial Physiological Phenomena; D005075:Biological Evolution; D054884:Host-Pathogen Interactions; D006801:Humans
keywords: autophagy; intracellular bacteria; xenophagy