Autophagy in liver diseases: A review.
Level 5 - mechanism / opinion, no new human data
Narrative review synthesizing molecular and mechanistic concepts without systematic methodology or primary human data.
PubMed 34120768 · doi:10.1016/j.mam.2021.100973
What was done
This narrative review summarizes literature on the physiological roles of autophagy in the liver, selective autophagy pathways, molecular regulatory signaling in various hepatic cell types, and the pathological consequences of autophagy dysfunction across diverse liver diseases.
What was found
The abstract reports no numerical findings or statistical estimates. It outlines that hepatic autophagy fluctuates with nutritional status (fed versus fasting), hormonal signaling, and circadian cycles, and summarizes evidence linking defective autophagy to non-alcoholic fatty liver disease, alcohol-associated liver disease, drug-induced liver injury, cholestasis, viral hepatitis, and hepatocellular carcinoma.
Why it matters
Provides a broad mechanistic overview connecting basal and selective autophagy to liver homeostasis, highlighting autophagy pathways as candidate targets for hepatoprotective and therapeutic interventions.
Limits
As a non-systematic narrative review, it lacks formal study selection criteria, risk-of-bias assessment, or quantitative pooling. The abstract discusses broad pathophysiological concepts rather than clinical outcome data from human trials.
Cited by
- supports Autophagy levels in the liver increase during the fasting phase.