Downregulation of mRNA transcripts of positive gene regulators of autophagy such as BECN1, ATG5, ATG9, FBXW7 (F-box and WD repeat domain containing 7) and GAS5 (growth arrest-specific 5) has been observed in the CNS of scrapie-infected wild-type or transgenic mice and sheep naturally affected with classical scrapie (Mok et al., 2007; Lopez-Perez et al., 2019b, 2020). The gene discussed is BECN1; the disease is scrapie.