Reconstitution of autophagosomal membrane tethering reveals that the ability of Atg11 to bind membranes is important for mitophagy.

Autophagy is essential for the degradation of mitochondria from yeast to humans. Mitochondrial autophagy in yeast is initiated when the selective autophagy scaffolding protein Atg11 is recruited to mitochondria through its interaction with the selective autophagy receptor Atg32. This also results in the recruitment of small 30 nm vesicles that fuse to generate the initial autophagosomal membrane.