Metabolism strikes back: metabolic flux regulates cell signaling
- 1Department of Chemical Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA;
- 2Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA;
- 3Department of Biology, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA
Abstract
Mammalian cells depend on growth factor signaling to take up nutrients; however, coordination of glucose and glutamine uptake has been a mystery. In this issue of Genes & Development, Wellen and colleagues (pp. 2784–2799) show that glucose flux through the hexosamine biosynthesis pathway regulates growth factor receptor glycosylation and enables glutamine consumption. This mechanism ensures that cells do not engage in anabolic metabolism when nutrients are limiting, and highlights how substrate availability for protein modifications can modulate cell signaling.
Keywords
Footnotes
-
↵4 Corresponding author.
E-MAIL mvh{at}mit.edu; FAX (617) 253-3189.
-
Article is online at http://www.genesdev.org/cgi/doi/10.1101/gad.2010510.
- Copyright © 2010 by Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press
