Molecular biology reportsOct 16, 2026

Changing cell cleaning processes to improve skin wound healing: studying molecular steps for new treatments

Longevity & Aging Weekly Brief ↗PubMed ↗DOI ↗OA ↗

Updated Oct 17, 2026

Abstract

Autophagy is crucial for regulating inflammation, metabolism, and regeneration during wound healing.

Autophagy influences various stages of wound healing, including inflammation, proliferation, and remodelling.
In the inflammation stage, autophagy helps signal immune responses, generates cytokines, and directs macrophage activity.
During proliferation, autophagy supports the migration of skin cells, the function of fibroblasts, and the survival of endothelial cells, while reducing oxidative damage.
In the remodelling stage, autophagy is involved in the restructuring of the extracellular matrix and maturation of collagen.
Insufficient autophagy can hinder wound healing, while excessive autophagy may lead to problems in chronic wounds.
Potential therapies targeting autophagy show promise in preclinical studies but face challenges like lack of specificity and limited clinical trials.

Simplified

Rewiring of pathways regulating inflammation, metabolism, and regeneration must occur in a coordinated fashion during wound healing; however, this orchestration gets disrupted in chronic and diabetic wounds. Autophagy is a conserved lysosome-dependent pathway that controls the integration of nutrient homeostasis, adaptation to stresses, immune regulation, and cell remodelling during wound repair. Here we summarize the pivotal role of autophagy in the different crucial steps of wound healing. An open wound often attracts pathogens, leading to infection and inflammation. During this inflammation stage, autophagy mediates signalling from the pattern recognition receptors, generates cytokines, manoeuvres the defence against infection, and polarizes macrophage. During proliferation stage, autophagy promotes keratinocyte migration, fibroblast function, endothelial cell survival, angiogenesis, while minimizing oxidative injury and apoptosis. During the remodelling stage, autophagy participates in the remodelling of the extracellular matrix, collagen maturation, and scar formation. However, these processes are context-dependent; while insufficient autophagy prevents adaptation and regeneration, we see excessive autophagy may contribute to pathological conditions associated with chronic wounds. The analysis also considers new therapeutic approaches including mTOR and AMPK inhibitors, phytochemicals, exosomes from mesenchymal stem cells, and the use of biomaterials for the delivery of drugs. Although they improve re-epithelization, vascularization, and matrix organization in preclinical models, the clinical application of these approaches is hampered by the lack of specificity of the pathway, poor stability and penetrability of drugs, off-target effects, and a lack of clinical trials in humans.

Full Text

Full text is available at the source.

View Full Text ↗

Changing cell cleaning processes to improve skin wound healing: studying molecular steps for new treatments

Abstract

Full Text

You found one interesting study. We’ll send the next 7.

What Lands in Your Inbox Each Week:

Recent issues from the longevity & aging brief