Autophagy and autophagic cell death in Dictyostelium.

Autophagic cell death can be conveniently studied in Dictyostelium discoideum, an exceptionally favorable model not only because of its well-known genetic and experimental advantages but also because in Dictyostelium there is no apoptosis machinery that could interfere with nonapoptotic cell death. Moreover, autophagic cell death in Dictyostelium can be dissociated into a starvation-induced sensitization stage, during which autophagy is induced, and a death induction stage. We show here how to demonstrate, assess and analyze this autophagic cell death. This can be studied in vivo during the development of Dictyostelium, and in vitro, using modifications of the monolayer technique of Rob Kay et al. Methods to follow this autophagic cell death qualitatively and quantitatively are reported.