Is Aspartate an Excitatory Neurotransmitter?

Recent evidence has resurrected the idea that the amino acid aspartate, a selective NMDA receptor agonist, is a neurotransmitter. Using a mouse that lacks the glutamate-selective vesicular transporter VGLUT1, we find that glutamate alone fully accounts for the activation of NMDA receptors at excitatory synapses in the hippocampus. This excludes a role for aspartate and, by extension, a recently proposed role for the sialic acid transporter sialin in excitatory transmission.