Molecular Brain BioMed Central Research Open Access Autophagy activation and enhanced mitophagy characterize the Purkinje cells of pcd mice prior to neuronal death Lisa Chakrabarti1, Jeremiah Eng1, Nishi Ivanov2, Gwenn A Garden2,4 and Albert R La Spada*1,2,3,4,5 Address: 1Department of Laboratory Medicine, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA, 2Department of Neurology, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA, 3Division of Medical Genetics, Department of Medicine, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA, 4Center for Neurogenetics & Neurotherapeutics, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA and 5Departments of Pediatrics and Cellular & Molecular Medicine, University of California, San Diego, USA Email: Lisa Chakrabarti -
[email protected]; Jeremiah Eng -
[email protected]; Nishi Ivanov -
[email protected]; Gwenn A Garden -
[email protected]; Albert R La Spada* -
[email protected] * Corresponding author Published: 29 July 2009 Received: 30 May 2009 Accepted: 29 July 2009 Molecular Brain 2009, 2:24 doi:10.1186/1756-6606-2-24 This article is available from: http://www.molecularbrain.com/content/2/1/24 © 2009 Chakrabarti et al; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Abstract Purkinje cells are a class of specialized neurons in the cerebellum, and are among the most metabolically active of all neurons, as they receive immense synaptic stimulation, and provide the only efferent output from the cerebellum. Degeneration of Purkinje cells is a common feature of inherited ataxias in humans and mice.