Synapses have long been thought to rely exclusively on glucose metabolism for energy. In this issue of Nature Metabolism, Kumar et al. reveal that synapses can tap into fatty acid metabolism to fuel ATP production and maintain synaptic activity when glucose is limited.
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Acknowledgements
This work was supported by the Intramural Research Program of NINDS, NIH ZIA NS003029 and ZIA NS002946 (Z.-H.S.).
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Li, S., Sheng, ZH. Fuelling synapses via lipid metabolism. Nat Metab 7, 1310–1311 (2025). https://doi.org/10.1038/s42255-025-01306-w
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s42255-025-01306-w
