Líffræðifélag Íslands - biologia.is
Líffræðiráðstefnan 2023
Höfundar / Authors: Kári Ísleifsson, Valgerður J. Hjaltalín, Sigríður R. Franzdóttir, Margrét H. Ögmundsdóttir
Starfsvettvangur / Affiliations: Háskóli Íslands
Kynnir / Presenter: Kári Ísleifsson
Autophagy is an evolutionarily conserved catabolic process, present in all eukaryotic cells. A series of ubiquitin-like proteins called ATGs are crucial for the regulation of this process. An upstream E1-like enzyme, Atg7, mediates the assembly of a double-membraned structure known as an autophagosome that engulfs cytosolic cargo. The autophagosome ultimately fuses with a lysosome to form an autolysosome, in which the contents are degraded and subsequently reused by the cell.
Autophagy plays a vital role in tumorigenesis and is known to both aid and hinder the formation of various cancers. The fruit fly model Drosophila melanogaster offers a unique insight into the interplay between these factors, and how they might behave in vertebrates. Our aim is to characterize the role of autophagy in cancer progression and metastatic behavior. We start by setting up genetic tools to examine the effects of autophagy inhibition on the formation of tumors in Drosophila eye discs. These tools involve a mosaic overexpression of an oncogenic mutation in the eyes of fruit flies combined with the ablation of Atg7 in the whole organism. We intend to quantify the severity of these tumor formations using computative image analysis.
To confirm that autophagy was inhibited in our models, we have optimized and verified the effectiveness of two image analysis processes for the determination of autophagy flux, assessing autophagosomal and lysosomal fusion. In addition to these analyses, we have verifie