Interestingly, long-term insulin resistance can impair autophagy by reduced expression of transcriptional factors related to autophagic pathways; at the same time, reduced autophagy leads to an increased oxidative damage of the cell, for example by reduced clearance of non-functional mitochondria and increased expression of JNK pathway elements, thus further participating to the vicious cycle that perpetrates pathological processes in the cell [96,97]. The gene discussed is MAPK8; the disease is Insulin resistance.