During autophagy, cytosol, protein aggregates, and organelles are sequestered 
into double-membrane vesicles called autophagosomes and delivered to the 
lysosome/vacuole for breakdown and recycling of their basic components. In all 
eukaryotes this pathway is important for adaptation to stress conditions such as 
nutrient deprivation, as well as to regulate intracellular homeostasis by 
adjusting organelle number and clearing damaged structures. For a long time, 
starvation-induced autophagy has been viewed as a nonselective transport 
pathway; however, recent studies have revealed that autophagy is able to 
selectively engulf specific structures, ranging from proteins to entire 
organelles. In this paper, we discuss recent findings on the mechanisms and 
physiological implications of two selective types of autophagy: ribophagy, the 
specific degradation of ribosomes, and reticulophagy, the selective elimination 
of portions of the ER.