Autophagy is one of the mechanisms by which tumor cells escape death during starvation and drug treatments, and its inhibition increases the radiosensitivity of esophageal carcinoma cells.19 Activation of ERS induces autophagy in nerve cells.20 Therefore, we tested the role of EGFR and ERS signaling pathways on radiation‐induced autophagy and observed that EGFR knockdown downregulated the radiation‐induced expression of the autophagy marker protein LC3B and the related pathway protein Atg3, whereas salubrinal and tunicamycin reversed these effects partly (Figure 4B‐C). This evidence concerns the gene EGFR and carcinoma of esophagus.