STUB1-VCP/p97 complex regulates mitophagy via fine-tuning of PINK1 levels

  • Cell Rep. 2026 Mar 27;45(4):117183. doi: 10.1016/j.celrep.2026.117183.
Jin-Yi Lin  1 ,  Ze-Bo Huang  1 ,  Shi-Qi Zhang  2 ,  Yong Wu  1 ,  Ling-Jun Cheng  1 ,  Xiangzheng Gao  3 ,  Sofie Lautrup  2 ,  Shu-Qin Cao  2 ,  Junping Pan  2 ,  Dade Rong  3 ,  Ruixue Ai  2 ,  Hayden Weng Siong Tan  4 ,  Liming Wang  5 ,  Haihe Wang  6 ,  Han-Ming Shen  3 ,  Evandro F Fang  7 ,  Guang Lu  8
Affiliations
  • 1. Department of Physiology, Zhongshan School of Medicine, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510080, China.
  • 2. Department of Clinical Molecular Biology, University of Oslo and Akershus University Hospital, 1478 Lørenskog, Norway.
  • 3. Faculty of Health Sciences, Ministry of Education Frontiers Science Center for Precision Oncology, University of Macau, Macau 999078, China.
  • 4. Department of Physiology, Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine, National University of Singapore, Singapore, Singapore.
  • 5. School of Biomedical Sciences, Hunan University, Changsha 410082, China.
  • 6. Department of Biochemistry, Zhongshan School of Medicine, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510080, China.
  • 7. Department of Clinical Molecular Biology, University of Oslo and Akershus University Hospital, 1478 Lørenskog, Norway; The Norwegian Centre on Healthy Ageing (NO-Age) and the Norwegian National Anti-Alzheimer's Disease (NO-AD) Networks, 0372 Oslo, Norway. Electronic address: [email protected].
  • 8. Department of Physiology, Zhongshan School of Medicine, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510080, China. Electronic address: [email protected].
PMID: 41903135 DOI: 10.1016/j.celrep.2026.117183
Abstract

PINK1 is a master regulator of PINK1-parkin-mediated Mitophagy, a key process for maintaining mitochondrial homeostasis. The precise regulation of PINK1 is therefore essential for orchestrating Mitophagy. While proteolytic processing of PINK1 and degradation of cleaved PINK1 via the N-end rule under basal conditions have been extensively characterized, the mechanisms governing full-length PINK1 degradation upon mitochondrial damage remain enigmatic. Here, we demonstrate that PINK1 undergoes ubiquitination and proteasomal degradation during Mitophagy through the coordinated action of STUB1 and VCP/p97. Depletion of STUB1 stabilizes full-length PINK1, which paradoxically impairs Mitophagy through the acceleration of parkin degradation. At the organismal level, the STUB1-VCP axis plays an important role in neuronal mitophagy-related memory and learning capacities in the roundworm C. elegans. Congruently, this axis is impaired in the postmortem brain tissues from patients with Alzheimer's disease compared with cognitively normal controls. Collectively, our findings support STUB1-VCP as a molecular calibrator that fine-tunes full-length PINK1 levels to enable efficient Mitophagy and maintain mitochondrial homeostasis.

Keywords
Alzheimer’s disease; CP: metabolism; CP: molecular biology; PINK1; STUB1; VCP/p97; autophagy; mitophagy; parkin; ubiquitination-proteasome system.
Products