Excited to share our new preprint! biorxiv.org/content/10.6... We know that mitochondria make contacts with organelles, but determining whether these contacts establish functionally distinct mitochondrial populations has been challenging.

A Modular Platform for Purification of Organelle-associated Mitochondria Reveals Functional Specialization at Organelle Contact Sites

Mitochondria perform diverse metabolic and signaling functions, yet how these activities are spatially organized within the mitochondrial network of cells remains poorly understood. Organelle contact ...

biorxiv.org

A new preprint from our lab is out today at @elife.bsky.social! Our lab has focused on mechanisms by which mitochondrial metabolism supports cell proliferation. However, the observation that succinate dehydrogenase (SDH) mutations drive tumorigenesis seems paradoxical. doi.org/10.7554/eLif...

RESEARCH | (FHCC, US) ML Hart D Sokolov @lucasbsullivan.bsky.social et al Succinate acts as a competitive inhibitor of mammalian aspartate transcarbamylase leading to impaired pyrimidine biosynthesis and reduced proliferation under SDHi 🧪

Succinate dehydrogenase loss suppresses pyrimidine biosynthesis via succinate-mediated inhibition of aspartate transcarbamylase - Nature Metabolism

Succinate acts as a competitive inhibitor of mammalian aspartate transcarbamylase (ATCase), leading to impaired pyrimidine biosynthesis and reduced proliferation under SDH inhibition.

dlvr.it

Check out our recent Spotlight article in @cp-trendsendomet.bsky.social discussing intriguing new findings in mitochondrial lactate metabolism, written by graduate student Serwah Danquah! Paywall bypass link: authors.elsevier.com/a/1nNcv3jDgW...

Trends in Endocrinology and Metabolism@cp-trendsendomet.bsky.social · last mo.

Online Now: Mitochondria produce lactate to vent redox pressure #trends #endocrinology #metabolism

📢SAVE THE DATE! 2nd Redox Biology in Health & Disease Conference 📅Date: 25 - 28 May 2027 🌏Location: Durrës, Albania Sign up for updates to find out more information on the conference: bit.ly/4eF65xf #FusionCancerResearch #FusionMetabolism #FusionHumanDisease #RedoxBio

🚨Excited to announce a new preprint from our lab, where we describe an ancient metabolic axis that controls mitochondrial genome copy number; a mechanism we uncovered in human cells that stretches through evolution to control mtDNA in flies, yeast and even plants!

Very happy to share our new paper. Together with our wonderful collaborators, we found that L-2-HG, a metabolite often viewed as “toxic,” also has an essential physiological function in mice. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Mitochondrial l-2-hydroxyglutarate is a physiological signalling metabolite - Nature

l-2-Hydroxyglutarate is identified as a legitimate physiological signalling metabolite, and control of its levels is essential for postnatal growth and survival and correct renal development and funct...

nature.com

New out this week in @natmetabolism.nature.com – We measured dynamic aspartate changes following mitochondrial inhibition, finding that SDH inhibition causes a counterintuitive "aspartate rebound" effect, mediated by succinate impairing pyrimidine synthesis. www.nature.com/articles/s42...

Succinate dehydrogenase loss suppresses pyrimidine biosynthesis via succinate-mediated inhibition of aspartate transcarbamylase - Nature Metabolism

Succinate acts as a competitive inhibitor of mammalian aspartate transcarbamylase (ATCase), leading to impaired pyrimidine biosynthesis and reduced proliferation under SDH inhibition.

nature.com

Very interesting articles about cancer metabolism this month, and insightful reviews. Highlighting fresh articles and comments about cysteine and glutathione from @lucasbsullivan.bsky.social @ginadenicola.bsky.social @harrislab.bsky.social and others metabolist.wordpress.com/2026/05/04/m...

MetaboList – April 2026

Cystine / Glutathione / NADPH SLC33A1 exports oxidized glutathione to maintain endoplasmic reticulum redox homeostasis Shanshan Liu  (刘珊珊), Mark Gad, Caifan Li  (李采蘩), Kevin Cho, Yuyang Liu  (刘雨洋),…

metabolist.wordpress.com

Our review dissecting the nuanced roles of mitochondria during cancer progression, was just published in @annualreviews.bsky.social. This one was written by David Sokolov with his approachable and entertaining writing style. Check it out: www.annualreviews.org/content/jour...

Mitochondria, OXPHOS, and Cancer Progression: A Modular View

Mitochondrial oxidative phosphorylation (OXPHOS) is an ancient metabolic process that is increasingly recognized as an important player in cancer onset, progression, and treatment resistance. In this ...

annualreviews.org

Check out our latest work out today in @natmetabolism.nature.com in which we describe a new metabotype (metabolic phenotype): excess cysteine stress. We discovered novel cysteine conjugates and show how pyruvate modulates free intracellular cysteine levels. Grateful for an awesome team!!

Nature Metabolism@natmetabolism.nature.com · 4mo ago

Pleased to share our recent work out today in @natmetabolism.nature.com. This study addresses a longstanding mystery - NRF2-driven cancers increase cysteine acquisition (via xCT) by ~5x - so where does all that cysteine go?

Nature Metabolism@natmetabolism.nature.com · 4mo ago

A big chunk of my postdoctoral work on cell-state dependent metabolism is now out at @cp-molcell.bsky.social: www.cell.com/molecular-ce... 1/

Aspartate availability drives differential engagement of the malate-aspartate shuttle

Brunner et al. report that malate-aspartate shuttle engagement is cell-state dependent and can be modulated by the availability of the amino acid aspartate. In differentiated cells, malate-aspartate s...

cell.com

For ~century, we’ve asked: why do proliferating cells ferment glucose even when O2 is around? I’m thrilled to share our latest work @natmetabolism.nature.com, led by @thebiokimist.bsky.social. By leveraging conditional essentiality in HPLM, we propose a provocative new answer to this classic Q. 🧵

new out in Nature www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Nutrient requirements of organ-specific metastasis in breast cancer - Nature

How the complex interplay between multiple nutrients within the microenvironment dictates potential sites of metastatic cancer growth is explored.

nature.com

Our work detailing the metabolic roles of serum for cancer cell proliferation is now out at JBC, @asbmbjournals.bsky.social! Congrats to Oliver and Eric and many thanks to the editor and reviewers for a thoughtful and efficient review process. See here: www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Defined media reveal the essential role of lipid scavenging in supporting cancer cell proliferation

Fetal bovine serum (FBS) is an undefined additive that is ubiquitous to mammalian cell culture media and whose functional contributions to promoting c…

sciencedirect.com

Lucas Sullivan@lucasbsullivan.bsky.social · last yr.

Excited to share a recent preprint by Oliver Newsom, where we evaluate the functional contributions of serum for cancer cell proliferation. Inside: A broadly applicable serum-free media, Quantitative lipid uptake characterization, Evidence lipid scavenging > synthesis for cancer cell proliferation.

Check out this great interview with a true rising star in metabolism research (and lab alumni)! 🙌

Shefali@iamshef.bsky.social · last yr.

#MetabolismMondays Meet Anna Vigil, #PhD student in @justinmcrocker.bsky.social lab @embl.org @embldbunit.bsky.social, discussing her work on how #metabolism impacts cell fate, development & #evolution #Drosophila. #theNodeCorrespondents #ecr @the-node.bsky.social #DevBio

Our paper on regulation of BCAA catabolism by mitochondrial calcium signaling is out! Mitochondrial calcium signaling regulates branched-chain amino acid catabolism in fibrolamellar carcinoma | Science Advances www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Mitochondrial calcium signaling regulates branched-chain amino acid catabolism in fibrolamellar carcinoma

Mitochondrial Ca2+ signaling regulates branched-chain amino acid catabolism in an adolescent liver cancer.

science.org

Mass Spec xkcd.com/3094/

Niemi lab graduate student Hannah Pletcher recently joined @prelights.bsky.social and wrote nice highlight of recent work from @lucasbsullivan.bsky.social - check it out here!

Succinate Dehydrogenase loss causes cascading metabolic effects that impair pyrimidine biosynthesis - preLights

Not all aspartate limitation is created equal: An aspartate biosensor reveals that inhibiting succinate dehydrogenase results in defects in pyrimidine synthesis and replication stress, unique from oth...

bit.ly

Our latest, in Science Advances: In vivo CRISPR screen revealed sgRNAs that switch chemosensitive SCLC PDXs to become resistant.We validated KEAP1 as key hit and found KEAP1 alterations in IMpower133 trial, where active NRF2 links to reduced survival in chemo arm www.science.org/doi/10.1126/... 1/2

Overjoyed to have the opportunity to present my work orally at the Cancer Metabolism Showcase! Hope to see you there virtually!

Isaac Harris@harrislab.bsky.social · last yr.

Less than two weeks until the 2025 Cancer Metabolism Showcase and Workshops! Speaker lineup now online! Register today! www.cancermetabolismshowcase.org

From Nobel prize winning cancer researcher Bill Kaelin Killing the Science Golden Goose - The American Journal of Medicine www.amjmed.com/article/S000...

Obliteride registeration opens today!!! Join the @lucasbsullivan.bsky.social team and help to CURE CANCER FASTER! See you August 9th at the starting line!! @obliteride.bsky.social #Obliteride #Obliteride2025 secure.fredhutch.org/goto/sulliva...

Poster is printed! Looking forward to going to the Keystone Tumor Metabolism meeting next week in Vancouver. Come talk to me about NRF2, cysteine, and novel metabolite discovery! #KSTumorMetab25 #cancermetabolism #keystonesymposia

happy to share our forum now online @Cell_Metabolism! fun for us (Guy & myself) to collaborate with @dfazakerley.bsky.social, Joycelyn, & Sam in putting together what we hope will be a useful piece for the broad metabolism community re: in vitro modeling! www.cell.com/cell-metabol...

Seeing the world through the eyes of cultured cells

The metabolic environment experienced by cultured cells often differs from physiological conditions. Here, we highlight the effects that the microenvironment can have on cultured cell behavior and adv...

cell.com

We were delighted to have @king5news.com.web.brid.gy visit us in the Termini Lab to discuss how NIH funding cuts could affect cancer research: m.youtube.com/watch?v=Szo9... We NEED indirect costs to provide funding needed complete research studies that will lead to life saving discoveries.

Potential NIH funding cuts could affect local cancer research

YouTube video by KING 5 Seattle

m.youtube.com

Next, our 2nd preprint of the week (!), this one driven by @madelouhart.bsky.social Previously: Mitochondrial inhibition impairs cell proliferation by constraining aspartate (ASP) availability. Here: we investigate the kinetics of ASP depletion/ proliferation impairments and...surprises ensue!

bioRxivpreprint@biorxivpreprint.bsky.social · last yr.

Succinate Dehydrogenase loss causes cascading metabolic effects that impair pyrimidine biosynthesis https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.02.18.638948v1