TLR9 and Sepsis: In addition, cytosolic mtDNA fragments also stimulate inflammation signals like TLR9 and cyclic GMP–AMP synthase, to aggravate the inflammatory response of sepsis (Schafer et al., 2016; West and Shadel, 2017; Hu et al., 2019), which emphasizes the significant role of autophagy in clearing DNA during the development of sepsis.