The nerve growth-repellent activity that generates spinal nerve repeat-patterning in birds and mammals is identified at the molecular level, and a similar system is revealed in adult brain grey matter.

PTEN mutations disrupt inhibitory GABAergic signaling, causing neurodevelopmental defects that can be mitigated by β-hydroxybutyrate, which activates DAF-16/FOXO and may offer a therapeutic approach for excitation/inhibition imbalances.

The evolutionary loss of the main enzyme required for ketone body biosynthesis suggests that alternative strategies to provide energy for large brains during fasting evolved repeatedly in mammals.

Volatile anesthetics impair hepatic tricarboxylic acid cycle function in adult and neonatal mice, with citrate accumulation driving a neonate-specific inhibition of beta-oxidation and ketosis through their increased relative sensitivity to malonyl-CoA.

UV-reflective dragonfly wax is shown to consist of very long-chain methyl ketones and aldehydes, and a synthetic dragonfly wax spontaneously forms light-scattering fine structures with strong UV reflection.

Acetate concentration, which is significantly increased in association with energy stresses such as those that occur with diabetes or starvation, is emerging as a novel 'ketone body' with potential as a parameter for evaluating the progression of energy stress.

Glutamatergic neurons lacking the mitochondrial pyruvate carrier show reduced M-type potassium channel activity and hyperexcitability upon intense firing.

Drosophila renal stem cells are exceptional in abundance, require induction to produce a single cell type, principal cells, and mitigate damage during adulthood associated with external stresses.

Exposure to ketone bodies in early development can reduce neurological impairments in a strain of the nematode C. elegans with PTEN defects.

The immunoglobulin superfamily cell surface protein Sticks and Stones is a binding partner for the Lar Drosophila receptor tyrosine phosphatase that mediates Lar's developmental functions at the larval neuromuscular junction, mushroom body, and adult optic lobe.