Autophagy regulation through stress-dependent plasticity of the autophagy initiation complex

Dr. Angelina Gross
Institute of Molecular Plant Biology, BOKU University Vienna

To survive under harsh and changing environmental conditions, plants rely on rapid cellular reprogramming processes. Autophagy – a highly conserved mechanism for the targeted degradation of cellular components – allows plants to rebalance their cellular proteome and metabolome in response to stress. Mechanistically, how autophagy is induced under different and complex stress conditions remains elusive. Here, we aim at dissecting the regulatory logic of stress-dependent autophagy initiation using Arabidopsis thaliana.

In plants, autophagy is dynamically activated and inactivated under a vast range of environmental stimuli. Our lab investigates how at a molecular level, plants sense and translate abiotic stress signals such as heat-, salt- and light-stress into adaptive autophagic responses. Combining state-of-the-art biochemistry and cell biology tools, such as mass-spectrometry coupled immuno-pulldown and laser confocal microscopy, we characterize the stress-dependent plasticity of the ATG1 kinase complex in the model plant Arabidopsis thaliana. This highly dynamic protein interaction hub regulates the initiation of autophagy upon integration of upstream signaling. Providing a binding platform for selective autophagy receptors, the ATG1 kinase complex plays a significant role in selective autophagy. We anticipate our research to contribute to our understanding of how plants fine-tune selective autophagy subroutines in response to environmental stimuli.