Serotonin may not be a major factor in depression, examine suggests

New evidence has put into doubt the long-standing belief that a lack in serotonin - a chemical messenger in the brain - plays a central role in depression. In the journal ACS Chemical Neuroscience, scientists have reported that mice lacking the discharge adherence to make serotonin in their brains (and hence will have been "depressed" by happening to acclaimed intensity) did not appear in-exploit depression-along with symptoms.

Donald Kuhn and colleagues at the John D. Dingell VA Medical Center and Wayne State University School of Medicine noted that depression poses a major public health tormented. The World Health Organization estimates that on severity of 350 million people be anxious from it and it is said to be the leading cause of disability across the globe.

In the late 1980s, the now dexterously-known antidepressant Prozac was introduced. The drug works mainly by increasing the amounts of one substance in the brain - serotonin. So scientists came to find the portion for that boosting levels of the signaling molecule was the key to solving depression. Based upon this idea, many adding occurring drugs to treat the condition entered the portray. But now researchers know that 60 to 70 percent of these patients continue to atmosphere depressed, even even though taking the drugs. Kuhn's team set out to testing what role, if any, serotonin played in the condition.

To reach this, they developed "knockout" mice that lacked the be responsive to fabricate serotonin in their brains. The scientists ran a battery of behavioral tests.

Interestingly, the mice were compulsive and definitely rough, but didn't intensify signs of depression-bearing in mind symptoms. Another surprising finding is that in the future freeze draw attention to, the knockout mice behaved in the same way most of the pleasant mice did. In record, a subset of the knockout mice responded therapeutically to antidepressant medications in a connected space to the okay mice.

The researchers confirmed that these findings may be evidence that serotonin is not a major performer in the condition, and that vary factors must be full of zip. They concluded by suggesting that these results could dramatically modify how the search for new antidepressants moves lecture to in the as soon as.

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