A recent report showed that Drosophila miR-307a initiates endoplasmic reticulum (ER) stress in wingless (wg)-expressing cells by suppression of the evolutionarily conserve Wnt secretion factor Wntless (Wls). Interestingly, the authors noted that wg has a putative C-terminal dilysine motif (KKVY), which is required for its apparent retrograde Golgi-to-ER transport. Wls suppression resulted in ER stress, which was phenocopied by several other manipulations that impaired wg secretion in flies, as well as Wnt5a secretion in mammalian cells. The authors surmised that their data "reveals a previously unknown Golgi-to-ER retrograde route of wg, and elucidates a correlation between Wnt secretion and ER stress." However, there are obvious caveats to this interpretation, as ER stress resulting from Wnt secretion impairment could be readily explained by its inability to leave the ER, and not resulting from Golgi-to-ER retrograde transport. J. Cell. Physiol. 231: 2315-2316, 2016. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
© 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.