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Research Paper

A UDP-glucose derivative is required for vacuolar autophagic cell death

Emilie Tresse, Artemis Kosta, Corinne Giusti, Marie-Françoise Luciani and Pierre Golstein

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Autophagic cell death in Dictyostelium can be dissociated into a starvation-induced sensitization stage and a death induction stage. A UDP-glucose pyrophosphorylase (ugpB) mutant and a glycogen synthase (glcS) mutant shared the same abnormal phenotype. In vitro, upon starvation alone mutant cells showed altered contorted morphology, indicating that the mutations affected the pre-death sensitization stage. Upon induction of cell death, most of these mutant cells underwent death without vacuolization, distinct from either autophagic or necrotic cell death. Autophagy itself was not grossly altered as shown by conventional and electron microscopy. Exogenous glycogen or maltose could complement both ugpB^- and glcS^- mutations, leading back to autophagic cell death. The glcS- mutation could also be complemented by 2-deoxyglucose that cannot undergo glycolysis. In agreement with the in vitro data, upon development glcS^- stalk cells died but most were not vacuolated. We conclude that a UDP-glucose derivative (such as glycogen or maltose) plays an essential energy-independent role in autophagic cell death.

Authors

Emilie Tresse

Centre d'Immunologie de Marseille-Luminy

Artemis Kosta

Centre d'Immunologie de Marseille-Luminy

Corinne Giusti

Centre d'Immunologie de Marseille-Luminy

Marie-Françoise Luciani

Centre d'Immunologie de Marseille-Luminy

Pierre Golstein

Centre d'Immunologie de Marseille-Luminy

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If the document does not open, please right-click on the link (control-click on a Macintosh) and select the option to save the file to disk.