Lysosomal Degradation Research Group

Autophagy (cellular self-digestion by lysosomes) is activated in response to starvation in all eukaryotic cells, and it ensures survival by recycling dispensable cellular constituents for re-use in synthetic processes. In animals, autophagy has been adopted to serve additional functions beyond starvation survival that include regulation of lifespan, stress responses, cellular homeostasis, cell death, immunity, cancer, neurodegeneration diseases, obesity and lipid metabolism, and more. The biomedical relevance of autophagy is well-established by now, also evident from the 2016 Nobel Prize awarded to a yeast autophagy researcher.

Our group mainly uses the popular animal model Drosophila to study the genetics, cell biology, biochemistry, and the physiological and pathological roles and mechanisms of autophagy, crinophagy (lysosomal degradation of secretory granules) and endocytosis for many years by now. More recently, we developed an interest into how all these lysosomal degradation pathways are coordinated, not only in Drosophila but also in cultured human cells.