Cover Story Current Issue
Autoimmunity, cancer, obesity and diabetes are associated with abnormal cellular bioenergetics in various cell types (reviewed in. The most fundamental parameters of cellular bioenergetics are respiration and anaerobic-like glycolysis, hereafter termed glycolysis. Cellular metabolism controls cell fate decisions and immune cell effector functions and vice versa, cell-intrinsic programs control metabolism. In addition, changing environments induce the rewiring of redox networks. For instance, germinal center responses, plasma cell differentiation and humoral immunity require oxidative phosphorylation (OxPhos) in B cells, while pre germinal center B cell proliferation depends on pyruvate reduction by lactate dehydrogenase A. In pathologic conditions, such as rheumatoid arthritis (RA), T cells with a short-lived, pro-inflammatory effector phenotype appear in the blood. This correlates with mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) damage. Hence, identifying immune cell metabolic phenotypes discriminating healthy from pathological conditions may be a key tool for diagnostic purposes. Indeed, alterations in cell metabolism have been linked to disease for a long: Otto Warburg has found that tumor cells produce lactate even under aerobic conditions, a phenomenon that also may take place in rapidly proliferating non-transformed cells or in cells with defects of complex I assembly.
Current Issue
You are what you eat
Here is a video of Vimeo. When the iframes is activated, a connection to Vimeo is established and, if necessary, cookies from Vimeo are also used. For further information on cookies policy click here.