Background of Microautophagy in Yeast Assessment
The lysosomes in yeast are equivalent to vesicles. The diameter of lysosomes in proliferating brewer's yeast is about 2 μm, which is four times the diameter of typical lysosomes in mammals. Therefore, yeast is a model organism for studying microautophagy. After the initial characterization of microautophagy in mammals in the 1980s, most of the progress in the next two decades came from studies on yeast. Microautophagy involves direct invagination and fission of the vesicle/lysosome membrane under nutrient limitation. In Saccharomyces cerevisiae, microautophagic uptake of soluble cytoplasmic proteins occurs via the autophagy tube, a highly specialized invagination of the vesicle membrane. Macroautophagy has been slowly studied in mammals, and breakthroughs in yeast have sparked rapidly growing interest.
Fig. 1. Microautophagy in yeast. (Schuck S, 2020)
Services
The yeast vesicle is a highly dynamic organelle with remarkable morphological changes. Microautophagy has been found to be involved in the selective degradation of organelles such as peroxisomes, nuclei and mitochondria in yeast studies and has been extensively studied. At CD BioSciences, we are committed to providing comprehensive services for the identification of yeast microautophagy to our clients worldwide. We have established yeast vesicles as a model system for membrane dynamics studies and successfully developed a customized process for the identification of yeast microautophagy.
(1) Yeast cell culture.
(2) Vesicle preparation.
(3) Confocal microscopy or conventional fluorescence microscopy to analyze in vivo vesicle staining and GFP-Vtc-Proteins.
(4) Electron microscopy to study ultrastructure of thin sections, freeze fracture analysis and immunogold labeling of thin sections.
(5) In vitro reconstruction of microautophagy experiments.
Microautophagy has more diverse morphological and molecular mechanisms. We provide multiple strategies to analyze different types of microautophagy in yeast cells.
Microautophagy in Yeast Cells with Lysosomal Protrusion
We established the methylotrophic Komagataella phaffii as a model organism to study peroxisome dynamics. In addition, we help you identify genes required for vesicle membrane dynamics, such as Vac8 and Atg18, by a random mutagenesis approach.
Microautophagy in Yeast Cells with Lysosomal Invaginations
Vesicle membrane proteins are degraded by this type of microautophagy. We set up Saccharomyces cerevisiae as model organism to analyze this process, containing dependence on Atg gene products, lipid microregion formation and dependence on ESCRT machinery.
Endo-Internal Trapping of Microautophagy in Yeast Cells
We set up Schizosaccharomyces pombe as model organism to analyze several bridging proteins of this type of microautophagy, and the molecular functions of Nbr1 and Hsc70.
Why Choose Us
- The organelles can be easily stained by in vivo fluorescence microscopy.
- Yeast vesicles can be prepared in milligram quantities per day and are an excellent system for biochemical studies and in vitro assays.
- Allows the reconstruction of the real microautophagic process with a minimum of factors.
- Allows not only the identification of new factors involved in the microautophagy process, but also the detailed exploration of its mechanism of action.
- Allows to specifically disrupt different microautophagic processes and assess their physiological functions.
CD BioSciences can meet any reasonable needs of our clients, taking time and budget into consideration for you. Our aim is to be customer-centric and to provide the highest quality services to customers. Our customer service representatives are enthusiastic and trustworthy 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. If you are interested in our services, please feel free to contact us for more information or a detailed discussion.
References
- Uttenweiler A, Mayer A. (2008) Microautophagy in the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Methods Mol Biol. 445:245-59.
- Schuck S. (2020) Microautophagy-distinct molecular mechanisms handle cargoes of many sizes[J]. Journal of Cell Science. 133(17): jcs246322.