Cellular Self-Eating Promotes Pancreatitis

To survive tough times, cells sometimes resort to a form of self-cannibalism called autophagy. But as Hashimoto et al. reveal, autophagy can have a down side, destroying the pancreas by prematurely activating a digestive enzyme. In autophagy, a vesicle swallows a portion of cytoplasm and ferries it to the lysosome for digestion. The process is often beneficial, allowing hungry cells to recycle molecules, for example.

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Filed under: GastroIntestinal / Gastroentorology on July 4th, 2008