Dendritic autophagy degrades postsynaptic proteins and is required for long-term synaptic depression in mice

Abstract

Pruning dendritic spines requires autophagy. Here, the authors show that autophagy is required for long-term depression (LTD), a major form of synaptic plasticity. LTD induces the biogenesis of autophagic vesicles locally in dendrites to facilitate the degradation of postsynaptic proteins.