Autophagy in protists and their hosts: When, how and why?

ROMANO, PATRICIA SILVIA; AKEMATSU, TAKAHIKO; BESTEIRO, SÉBASTIEN; BINDSCHEDLER, ANNINA; CARRUTHERS, VERN B.; CHAHINE, ZEINAB; COPPENS, ISABELLE; DESCOTEAUX, ALBERT; LOPES ALBERTO DUQUE, THABATA; HE, CYNTHIA Y.; HEUSSLER, VOLKER; LE ROCH, KARINE G.; LI, FENG-JUN; PERRONE BEZERRA DE MENEZES, JULIANA; MENNA-BARRETO, RUBEM FIGUEIREDO SADOK; MOTTRAM, JEREMY C.; SCHMUCKLI-MAURER, JACQUELINE; TURK, BORIS; TAVARES VERAS, PATRICIA SAMPAIO; SALASSA, BETIANA NEBAI; VANRELL, MARÍA CRISTINA

Autophagy Reports

Taylor & Francis Group.

Año: 2023 vol. 2

Pathogenic protists are a group of organisms responsible for causing a varietyof human diseases including malaria, sleeping sickness, Chagas disease, leishmaniasis,and toxoplasmosis, among others. These diseases, which affect more than one billion people globally, mainly the poorest populations, are characterized by severe chronic stages and the lack of effective antiparasitic treatment. Parasitic protists display complex life-cycles and go through different cellular transformations in order to adapt to the different hosts they live in. Autophagy, a highly conserved cellular degradation process, has emerged as a key is required for these differentiation processes, as well as other functions that are crucial to parasite fitness. In contrast to yeasts and mammals, protist autophagy is characterized by a modest number of conserved autophagy- related proteins (ATGs) that, even though, can drive autophagosome formation and degradation. In addition, during their intracellular cycle, the action of these pathogens with the host autophagy system plays a crucial role resulting in a beneficial or harmful effect that is important for the outcome of the infection. In this review, we summarize the current state of knowledge on autophagy and other related mechanisms in pathogenic protists and their hosts. We sought to emphasize when, how, and why this process takes place, and the effects it may have on the parasitic cycle. A better understanding of the significance of autophagy for the protist life-cycle will potentially be helpful to design novel anti-parasitic strategies.