Discovered: Metabolic Mechanism of Cytokine Storms

By studying influenza in mice and cells, researchers identify a glucose metabolism pathway critical to the dysregulated immune response that kills many infectious disease patients, including those with COVID-19.

Written byRuth Williams

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ABOVE: Influenza A virus particles
WIKIMEDIA CDC/ DR. ERSKINE PALMER

A study of influenza infection shows that glucose metabolism is a driving force underlying the development of the often deadly inflammatory response known as a cytokine storm, according to a report in Science Advances today (April 15). The results, which identify potential drug targets for future treatments, may partly explain why patients with diabetes are at an increased risk of serious complications and death from influenza and other infections. Preliminary data indicate this appears to be the case for COVID-19 as well.

“It’s a nice piece of work building on previous observations from influenza and other viral systems,” says immunologist Paul Thomas of St. Jude Children's Research Hospital who was not a member of the research team. “It really drills down to the molecular mechanism of . . . this metabolic regulation of inflammation and viral replication.”

During an infection, the ...

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Meet the Author

Ruth Williams
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Ruth is a freelance journalist. Before freelancing, Ruth was a news editor for the Journal of Cell Biology in New York and an assistant editor for Nature Reviews Neuroscience in London. Prior to that, she was a bona fide pipette-wielding, test tube–shaking, lab coat–shirking research scientist. She has a PhD in genetics from King’s College London, and was a postdoc in stem cell biology at Imperial College London. Today she lives and writes in Connecticut.
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