Juncai Ma

This study identifies SPL2 as a mitochondrial E3 ligase that regulates seedling emergence by controlling ER-mitochondrial interactions and mitophagy through ubiquitination of mitochondrial proteins.

The paper identifies a conserved selective autophagy receptor, CESAR, critical for proteostasis under heat stress in plants through cross-species interactome analysis.

This study identifies ERC1 as a protein that forms biomolecular condensates to recruit ATG8 and NBR1, promoting autophagosome formation and enhancing heat tolerance in Arabidopsis.

The paper shows that different ATG8 isoforms in Arabidopsis have specialized functions in autophagy, as demonstrated by a mutant lacking all nine isoforms and complementation experiments.

This study identifies VDAC1, VDAC2, and VDAC3 as mitophagy receptors in Arabidopsis, facilitating ATG8 recruitment to depolarized mitochondria during uncoupler-induced mitophagy.

This study shows that metabolic enzymes act as autophagy receptors in plants to degrade defense executors during viral infection, revealing autophagy as a tolerance pathway rather than an antiviral defense.

This study identifies Friendly as a mediator of mitophagy in Arabidopsis, showing its role in stress-induced and developmental mitophagy.