title: Mystery solved: Trehalose kickstarts autophagy by blocking glucose transport.
abstract: Although vertebrates cannot synthesize the natural disaccharide trehalose, exogenous administration of trehalose to mammalian cells may be beneficial for protein misfolding disorders. In this issue, DeBosch et al. show that trehalose may also be useful in treating nonalcoholic fatty liver disease and identify inhibition of cellular glucose import through SLC2A (also known as GLUT) transporters as a mechanism by which trehalose stimulates autophagy through the adenosine monophosphate-activated protein kinase (AMPK).
authors.affiliation: Biomedical Neuroscience Institute, Faculty of Medicine, University of Chile, Santiago, Chile. Center for Geroscience, Brain Health and Metabolism, Santiago, Chile. Program of Cellular and Molecular Biology, Center for Molecular Studies of the Cell, Institute of Biomedical Sciences, University of Chile, Santiago, Chile.
authors.forename: Pablo
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Mardones
authors.affiliation: Department of Medical Genetics, University of Cambridge, Cambridge Institute for Medical Research, Cambridge CB2 0XY, UK.
authors.forename: David C
authors.initials: DC
authors.lastname: Rubinsztein
authors.affiliation: Biomedical Neuroscience Institute, Faculty of Medicine, University of Chile, Santiago, Chile. Center for Geroscience, Brain Health and Metabolism, Santiago, Chile. Program of Cellular and Molecular Biology, Center for Molecular Studies of the Cell, Institute of Biomedical Sciences, University of Chile, Santiago, Chile. Department of Immunology and Infectious Diseases, Harvard School of Public Health, Boston MA, USA. chetz@med.uchile.cl chetz@hsph.harvard.edu.
authors.forename: Claudio
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Hetz
mesh_terms: D055372:AMP-Activated Protein Kinases / Q000378:metabolism*; D000818:Animals; D001343:Autophagy / Q000502:physiology*; D001693:Biological Transport, Active / Q000502:physiology; D005947:Glucose / Q000378:metabolism*; D051246:Glucose Transport Proteins, Facilitative / Q000378:metabolism*; D006801:Humans; D014199:Trehalose / Q000378:metabolism*
chemical_list: D051246:Glucose Transport Proteins, Facilitative; D014199:Trehalose; D055372:AMP-Activated Protein Kinases; D005947:Glucose