Autophagy is a cellular self-eating process to maintain cell health and homeostasis. During Drosophila melanogaster development, intestinal enterocytes undergo a developmentally programmed autophagy. This autophagy involves the selective recruitment of both mitochondria and ER cargoes into forming autophagosomes. Dr. Wang uses both sophisticated genetic and cell biological approaches to study the genes and mechanisms that regulate selective organelle clearance. Wang lab focuses on characterization of genes and mechanisms that are either specifically required for ER clearance, or reciprocally influence the balance of ER, mitochondria, and possibly other organelles in a cell in a physiological animal model, and possibly how alterations of this balance may contribute to diseases.

1. Wang R, Velentzas PD, Baehrecke EH. Mass isolation of staged Drosophila pupal intestines for analysis of protein ubiquitylation. STAR Protoc. 2023 Nov 10;4(4):102713.
2. Wang R, Fortier TM, Chai F, Miao G, Shen JL, Restrepo LJ, DiGiacomo JJ, Velentzas PD, Baehrecke EH. PINK1, Keap1, and Rtnl1 regulate selective clearance of endoplasmic reticulum during development. Cell. 2023 Sep 14;186(19):4172-4188.e18.
3. Wang R, Miao G, Shen JL, Fortier TM, Baehrecke EH. ESCRT dysfunction compromises endoplasmic reticulum maturation and autophagosome biogenesis in Drosophila. Curr Biol. 2022 Mar 28;32(6):1262-1274.e4.
4. Wang R^*, Tan J^*, Chen T, Han H, Tian R, Tan Y, Wu Y, Cui J, Chen F, Li J, Lv L, Guan X, Shang S, Lu J, Zhang Z. ATP13A2 facilitates HDAC6 recruitment to lysosome to promote autophagosome-lysosome fusion. J Cell Biol. 2019 Jan 7;218(1):267-284.