Blue-Print Autophagy in 2020: A Critical Review

Abstract

Autophagy is an elegant and complex biological process that has recently attracted much attention from the scientific community. The compounds which are capable of control and modulation of this process have a promising potential as therapeutics for a number of pathological conditions, including cancer and neurodegenerative disorders. At the same time, due to the relatively young age of the field, there are still some pitfalls in the autophagy monitoring assays and interpretation of the experimental data. This critical review provides an overview of the marine natural compounds, which have been reported to affect autophagy. The time period from the beginning of 2016 to the middle of 2020 is covered. Additionally, the published data and conclusions based on the experimental results are re-analyzed with regard to the guidelines developed by Klionsky and colleagues (Autophagy. 2016; 12(1): 1–222), which are widely accepted by the autophagy research community. Remarkably and surprisingly, more than half of the compounds reported to be autophagy activators or inhibitors could not ultimately be assigned to either category. The experimental data reported for those substances could indicate both autophagy activation and inhibition, requiring further investigation. Thus, the reviewed molecules were divided into two groups: having validated and non-validated autophagy modulatory effects. This review gives an analysis of the recent updates in the field and raises an important problem of standardization in the experimental design and data interpretation.

Posidonia oceanica (L.) Delile Extract Reduces Lipid Accumulation through Autophagy Activation in HepG2 Cells

“…Overall, this study provides evidence of the potential of POE to alleviate intracellular lipid accumulation through activation of autophagy. Thus, POE, which can control this process in liver cells, could have promising potential as an alternative medical strategy for a variety of disease conditions, including NAFLD [22,40].…”

Dual targets of lethal apoptosis and protective autophagy in liver cancer with periplocymarin elicit a limited therapeutic effect

“…4C ). Since simultaneously increased protein levels of p62/SQSTM1 and LC3-II indicated dysfunction of autophagy degradation ( 44 ), these findings suggested that PPM may have exerted differential effects at different stages of autophagy.…”

Depsipeptides Targeting Tumor Cells: Milestones from In Vitro to Clinical Trials

“…Most of the molecules we covered in this review eventually induce apoptosis. Certain molecules such as micropeptins and the tutuilamides A–C have demonstrated elastase inhibition properties [ 103 , 245 ], making them suitable anticancer agents because the levels of this protease are significantly elevated in various cancers [ 246 ]. Likewise, some specific depsipeptides that induce autophagy include apratoxin A, coibamide A, and plitidepsin, which induces macroautophagy via the autophagy-related protein 5–ubiquitin system [ 29 , 247 ].…”