Overview

• Researchers infused sodium lactate for one hour in 12 healthy adults, with six additional saline-only controls, in a randomized crossover design.
• Blood lactate peaked at values typical of medium to high‑intensity exercise, confirming the infusion achieved exercise‑like exposure.
• Circulating pro‑BDNF increased 15 minutes after infusion and remained elevated for about two hours before returning toward baseline.
• Mature BDNF in plasma and serum did not change, nor did pro‑BDNF measured in muscle tissue, leaving mechanisms and tissue source unresolved.
• The authors caution that lactate infusion is not a substitute for exercise and call for replication and mechanistic studies, noting publication in Frontiers in Cellular Neuroscience (DOI: 10.3389/fncel.2025.1644843).