Emerging role of autophagy in colorectal cancer: Progress and prospects for clinical intervention

Figure 1 Autophagy-related gene signaling pathway schematic. Autophagy can be mainly divided into five stages according to its development process: induction, autophagosome nucleation, autophagosome formation, lysosome fusion, and degradation. As shown in the diagram, the entire process is strictly regulated by over 36 autophagy-related genes and their corresponding proteins. The mammalian target of rapamycin is a key factor in autophagy. Mature autophagosomes can merge with lysosomes to form autolysosomes, which selectively remove proteins and damaged organelles through autophagy and participate in autophagic body formation. mTOR: Mammalian target of rapamycin.