The crucial role of the regulatory mechanism of the Atg1/ULK1 complex in fungi

Ying-Ying Cai; Lin Li; Xue-Ming Zhu; Jian-Ping Lu; Xiao-Hong Liu; Fu-Cheng Lin

doi:10.3389/fmicb.2022.1019543

The crucial role of the regulatory mechanism of the Atg1/ULK1 complex in fungi

Front Microbiol. 2022 Oct 26:13:1019543. doi: 10.3389/fmicb.2022.1019543. eCollection 2022.

Authors

Ying-Ying Cai^{1

2}, Lin Li¹, Xue-Ming Zhu¹, Jian-Ping Lu³, Xiao-Hong Liu², Fu-Cheng Lin^{1

2}

Affiliations

¹ State Key Laboratory for Managing Biotic and Chemical Treats to the Quality and Safety of Agro-products, Institute of Plant Protection and Microbiology, Zhejiang Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Hangzhou, China.
² State Key Laboratory for Managing Biotic and Chemical Treats to the Quality and Safety of Agro-products, Institute of Biotechnology, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China.
³ College of Life Science, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China.

Abstract

Autophagy, an evolutionarily conserved cellular degradation pathway in eukaryotes, is hierarchically regulated by autophagy-related genes (Atgs). The Atg1/ULK1 complex is the most upstream factor involved in autophagy initiation. Here，we summarize the recent studies on the structure and molecular mechanism of the Atg1/ULK1 complex in autophagy initiation, with a special focus on upstream regulation and downstream effectors of Atg1/ULK1. The roles of pathogenicity and autophagy aspects in Atg1/ULK1 complexes of various pathogenic hosts, including plants, insects, and humans, are also discussed in this work based on recent research findings. We establish a framework to study how the Atg1/ULK1 complex integrates the signals that induce autophagy in accordance with fungus to mammalian autophagy regulation pathways. This framework lays the foundation for studying the deeper molecular mechanisms of the Atg1 complex in pathogenic fungi.

Keywords: AMPK/Snf1; Atg1/ULK1 complex; TOR; autophagy; regulatory mechanism.

Publication types

Review