Autophagy during cardiac remodeling

•Autophagy is important for the quality control of proteins and organelles.•Autophagy is essential to maintain cellular homeostasis in the heart.•Cardiac remodeling is a chronic maladaptive process.•Autophagy is a cardioprotective mechanism during cardiac remodeling.•Mitochondrial DNA that escapes from autophagy causes inflammation and heart failure.

Despite progress in cardiovascular research and evidence-based therapies, heart failure is a leading cause of morbidity and mortality in industrialized countries. Cardiac remodeling is a chronic maladaptive process, characterized by progressive ventricular dilatation, cardiac hypertrophy, fibrosis, and deterioration of cardiac performance, and arises from interactions between adaptive modifications of cardiomyocytes and negative aspects of adaptation such as cardiomyocyte death and fibrosis. Autophagy has evolved as a conserved process for bulk degradation and recycling of cytoplasmic components, such as long-lived proteins and organelles. Accumulating evidence demonstrates that autophagy plays an essential role in cardiac remodeling to maintain cardiac function and cellular homeostasis in the heart. This review discusses some recent advances in understanding the role of autophagy during cardiac remodeling. This article is part of a Special Issue entitled: Autophagy in the Heart.