Protein synthesis. The perks of balancing glucose.

What do the regulation of translation initiation and glucose metabolism have to do with each other? Quite a lot, it seems, according to Sonenberg and Newgard in their Perspective. They discuss new findings that identify the kinase responsible for inactivating eIF2--a factor that is required for translation initiation (and hence protein synthesis)--when the endoplasmic reticulum is under stress. Loss of this kinase results in destruction of insulin-producing b cells in the pancreas and dysregulation of glucose homeostasis.