The Hentze lab has recently described that a human Vault RNA (vtRNA) specifically interacts with the autophagy receptor sequestosome-1/p62. Interfering with the vRNA's expression in cells leads to p62-dependent changes in the autophagic flux (Horos, 2017; bioarxiv). Importantly, this function seems to also be conserved in mice. Here, and in collaboration with the Hentze lab, we propose to investigate the physiological requirements of this interaction by generating and phenotypically characterizing mice carrying a conditional KO allele for the murine vtRNA.
