Time for lunch

Aggregated, misfolded proteins need to be removed by cells to avoid their build-up. Failure to do so often leads to disease. During a process called aggrephagy, aggregated proteins are marked with ubiquitin and clustered into molecular condensates, which are then degraded with the help of the autophagic machinery. In a new study published in EMBO Journal, Bernd Bauer, a PhD student in the Martens group, reveals how the cargo receptor protein TAX1BP1 facilitates the switch from cargo collection to autophagosome formation. Bernd’s findings show that TAX1BP1 recruits pro-autophagic factors to initiate autophagosome biogenesis by sensing the amount of ubiquitin within the cargo.