The endoplasmic reticulum (ER) is a site of protein biogenesis in eukaryotic cells. Perturbing ER homeostasis activates stress programs collectively called the unfolded protein response (UPR). The UPR enhances production of ER-resident chaperones and enzymes to reduce the burden of misfolded proteins. On resolution of ER stress, ill-defined, selective autophagic programs remove excess ER components. Here we identify Sec62, a constituent of the translocon complex regulating protein import in the mammalian ER, as an ER-resident autophagy receptor. Sec62 intervenes during recovery from ER stress to selectively deliver ER components to the autolysosomal system for clearance in a series of events that we name recovER-phagy. Sec62 contains a conserved LC3-interacting region in the C-terminal cytosolic domain that is required for its function in recovER-phagy, but is dispensable for its function in the protein translocation machinery. Our results identify Sec62 as a critical molecular component in maintenance and recovery of ER homeostasis. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/ncb3423Posted at the Zurich Open Repository and Archive, University of Zurich ZORA URL: https://doi.org/10.5167/uzh-127515 Accepted Version Originally published at: Fumagalli, Fiorenza; Noak, Julia; Bergmann, Timothy J; Presmanes, Eduardo Cebollero; Pisoni, Giorgia Brambilla; Fasana, Elisa; Fregno, Ilaria; Galli, Carmela; Loi, Marisa; Solda, Tatiana; D'Antuono, Rocco; Raimondi, Andrea; Jung, Martin; Melnyk, Armin; Schorr, Stefan; Schreiber, Anne; Simonelli, Luca; Varani, Luca; Wilson-Zbinden, Caroline; Zerbe, Oliver; Hofmann, Kay; Peter, Matthias; Quadroni, Manfredo; Zimmermann, Richard; Molinari, Maurizio (2016 To define mechanisms that regulate the return of ER-resident chaperones and folding factors to their physiologic intracellular level after resolution of an ER stress, we established a protocol for reversible induction of UPR in cultured mammalian cells (Fig. 1a). Briefly, human embryonic kidney cells (HEK293) or mouse embryonic fibroblasts (MEF) were exposed for 12 h to non-toxic doses of cyclopiazonic acid (CPA), a reversible inhibitor of the sarco/endoplasmic reticulum calcium pump 6 . The return of ER-resident gene products at their pre-stress level was monitored during resolution of the UPR obtained upon CPA wash out ( CPA wash out initiated a recovery phase characterized by the rapid return of ER stress-induced transcripts at, or below, their pre-stress levels (Fig. 1b, recovery, T 1/2 average â 1 h, blue line). The corresponding ER stress-induced proteins returned to their physiologic levels with much slower kinetics (Fig. 1c, d, T 1/2 average â 10 h, blue).
3With the exception of Herp, which is rapidly turned over with intervention of proteasomes (Fig. 1c, d (Fig. 1g, 2a) and other membrane and luminal ER marker proteins such as Sec62 and Crt ( Fig. 2b and Extended data Fig. 3) in 0.5-1.5 ”m diameter cytoplasmic puncta that rapidly disappeared upon BafA1 wash out (Extended data Fig. 4). Cytosolic puncta containing ER marker prot...