News & Comment

Recent technological advances permit the profiling of metabolic changes in single cells, which sheds light on how metabolism regulates immune responses. We advocate for accessible and standardized tools to reduce the barrier of entry to immunometabolism studies and facilitate the translation of fundamental findings towards clinical applications.

Non-alcoholic liver disease (NAFLD) is now metabolic dysfunction-associated steatotic liver disease (MASLD), emphasizing the key metabolic factors of obesity, insulin resistance, vascular dysfunction and dyslipidaemia. Here, we discuss impacts on the existing body of clinical and preclinical liver disease research and on research moving forward.

Continuous glucose monitoring (CGM) is increasingly being used to collect and evaluate data on glycaemic control for research purposes. However, the use of CGM in research settings requires proper understanding and handling of these devices for correct data collection and interpretation.

The prevailing notion that mitochondrial diseases arise from ATP deficiency is challenged by recent evidence that oxidative phosphorylation defects trigger maladaptive stress responses consuming excess energy. We argue that this chronic state of hypermetabolism imposes energetic constraints, thus causing mitochondrial disease pathophysiology, calling for careful translational studies from organelle to organism.

The field of personalized nutrition hypothesizes that ‘big data’ — biological, behavioural, social and environmental — can be leveraged to make more precise and effective dietary recommendations to individuals for improving health outcomes, compared to generic dietary advice. This article describes the research questions that need to be answered to understand whether personalized nutrition brings additional clinical utility.

Subcellular quantitative analysis has been a long-standing goal of mass spectrometry imaging, but was originally thought to be unattainable. However, recent advances have made organelle-level absolute quantification through mass spectrometry imaging a reality, thanks to the development of nano secondary ion mass spectrometry.

Spatial metabolomics has matured and is driving innovation in mass spectrometry, metabolomics and spatial omics. With exciting discoveries, complementary capabilities and increasing accessibility, it has secured its place in the spatial biology toolbox, showing promise in biology, medicine and pharmacology.

Growing evidence demonstrates the metabolic benefits of repeated cold exposure in humans. Here, we argue that skeletal muscle thermogenesis, rather than the stimulation of thermogenic adipose tissue, is required to elicit these benefits in humans.

The metabolomics literature suffers from ambiguity in the nomenclature for individual metabolites, which introduces a disconnect between publications and leads to misinterpretations. This Comment proposes recommendations for metabolite annotations to engage the scientific community and publishers to adopt a more consistent approach to metabolite nomenclature.

The environment experienced by an individual early in life has long-term health consequences. Here we summarize key factors that should be considered when designing studies in rodents that aim to address the developmental programming of metabolic disease.

As emerging clinical analyses suggest an increased risk of new-onset diabetes following COVID-19, a causal link and underlying mechanisms are yet to be established. Persistence of hyperglycaemia after disease regression and the potential infection of non-pancreatic tissue are adding another layer of complexity to the relationship between COVID-19 and diabetes mellitus.

In metabolic studies using rodents, body weight and food intake measurements seem easy to obtain, but several potential pitfalls can lead to erroneous data generation and interpretation. This Comment raises awareness of key conceptual and technical aspects that can increase the quality and reproducibility of this type of data.

The rapid increase in lipidomic data has triggered a community-based movement to develop guidelines and minimum requirements for generating, reporting and publishing lipidomic data. The creation of a dynamic checklist summarizing key details of lipidomic analyses using a common language has the potential to harmonize the field by improving both traceability and reproducibility.

Glucose clamps are challenging to conduct in mice and experimental approaches vary between laboratories, which complicates data interpretation and comparison of results. Here, we highlight key methodological differences and propose reporting standards for glucose clamps.

Coronavirus replication results in expenditure of nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide (NAD⁺), the central catalyst of cellular metabolism, in the innate response to infection. Repletion of NAD⁺ levels has the potential to enhance antiviral responses.

Sex as a biological variable influences almost all aspects of health and disease, yet many research studies use only males or do not consider sex differences. We describe why sex-specific reporting is needed, including in basic and animal research, and we outline recommendations for sex-specific reporting in manuscript abstracts, Methods and Results sections, tables and figures.

How to adjust metabolic rate (MR) in mice that differ in body mass and composition continues to lead to controversies. Here, the challenges that reside in the analysis of mouse MR are highlighted to spur consensus on the unequivocal use of regression-based analysis to maximize reliability and relevance of conclusions.

Diabetes therapeutic approaches continue to expand and to be refined. As the field moves toward more intensive insulin- and cell-based therapies, care must be taken to mimic healthy physiological insulin dynamics and avoid hyperinsulinemia, with its deleterious downstream complications.

The two most common tests for determining metabolic health in mice are the glucose tolerance test (GTT) and insulin tolerance test (ITT). GTTs and ITTs are inexpensive and easy to perform, but how they are conducted and interpreted can radically change their meaning.

Some ‘species differences’ between mice and humans can be diminished simply by housing mice at warmer temperatures. Failure to strategically turn up the thermostat may undermine the translation of findings in mice to insights into human metabolic diseases.