{"id":222228,"date":"2025-09-20T16:05:04","date_gmt":"2025-09-20T21:05:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2025\/09\/glucose-dependent-glycosphingolipid-biosynthesis-fuels-cd8-t-cell-function-and-tumor-control"},"modified":"2025-09-20T16:05:04","modified_gmt":"2025-09-20T21:05:04","slug":"glucose-dependent-glycosphingolipid-biosynthesis-fuels-cd8-t-cell-function-and-tumor-control","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2025\/09\/glucose-dependent-glycosphingolipid-biosynthesis-fuels-cd8-t-cell-function-and-tumor-control","title":{"rendered":"Glucose-dependent glycosphingolipid biosynthesis fuels CD8+ T cell function and tumor control"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"padding-right: 20px\"><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/glucose-dependent-glycosphingolipid-biosynthesis-fuels-cd8-t-cell-function-and-tumor-control2.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Glucose controls CD8+ T cell function.<\/p>\n<p>The researchers demonstrate that in CD8+ effector T cells, glucose metabolism extends beyond energy production by fueling glycosphingolipid (GSL) biosynthesis, a pathway critical for T cell expansion and cytotoxic function.<\/p>\n<p>The authors show that CD8+ effector T cells use glucose to synthesize uridine diphosphate-glucose (UDP-Glc), a precursor for glycogen, glycan, and GSL biosynthesis. Inhibiting GSL production impairs CD8+ T cell expansion upon pathogen challenge.<\/p>\n<p>Mechanistically, we show that glucose-dependent GSL biosynthesis is required for plasma membrane lipid raft integrity and optimal T cell receptor (TCR) signaling. <a href=\"https:\/\/sciencemission.com\/Glucose-dependent-glycosphingolipid-biosynthesis\">https:\/\/sciencemission.com\/Glucose-dependent-glycosphingolipid-biosynthesis<\/a><\/p>\n<hr>\n<p>Glucose is required for T cell proliferation and function, but its key metabolic fates <i>in vivo<\/i> are not well defined. Longo et al. demonstrate that in CD8+ effector T cells, glucose metabolism extends beyond energy production by fueling glycosphingolipid biosynthesis, a pathway critical for T cell expansion and cytotoxic function.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Glucose controls CD8+ T cell function. The researchers demonstrate that in CD8+ effector T cells, glucose metabolism extends beyond energy production by fueling glycosphingolipid (GSL) biosynthesis, a pathway critical for T cell expansion and cytotoxic function. The authors show that CD8+ effector T cells use glucose to synthesize uridine diphosphate-glucose (UDP-Glc), a precursor for glycogen, [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":662,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1497],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-222228","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-energy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/222228","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/662"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=222228"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/222228\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=222228"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=222228"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=222228"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}