Autophagy and mitochondrial metabolism: insights into their role and therapeutic potential in chronic myeloid leukaemia

Despite the development of selective BCR ‐ ABL ‐targeting tyrosine kinase inhibitors ( TKI s) transforming the management of chronic myeloid leukaemia ( CML ), therapy‐resistant leukaemic stem cells ( LSC s) persist after TKI treatment and present an obstacle to a CML cure. Recently, we and others have made significant contributions to the field by unravelling survival dependencies in LSC s to work towards the goal of eradicating LSC s in CML patients. In this review, we describe these findings focusing on autophagy and mitochondrial metabolism, which have recently been uncovered as two essential processes for LSC s quiescence and survival respectively. In addition, we discuss the therapeutic potential of autophagy and mitochondrial metabolism inhibition as a strategy to eliminate CML cells in patients where the resistance to TKI is driven by BCR ‐ ABL ‐independent mechanism(s).