현재 위치：홈 > 뉴스현황 > Press Events > Obesity Found to Hav...
저자： 업로드：2017-08-02 조회수：
Obesity means having too much body fat. It is different from being overweight, which means weighing too much. The weight may come from muscle, bone, fat, and/or body water. Both terms mean that a person's weight is greater than what's considered healthy for his or her height.
Researchers at The Rockefeller University report that two populations of cells in the brain may be responsible for regulating appetite. They published their findings (“Identification of a Brainstem Circuit Controlling Feeding”) in Cell.
The two types of cells, located in the dorsal raphe nucleus (DRN), are potential targets for new drugs to treat obesity by controlling the hunger signals that drive the search for and consumption of food.
“…we show that neurons in the dorsal raphe nucleus, expressing vesicular transporters for GABA [gamma-aminobutyric acid] or glutamate (hereafter, DRNVgat and DRNVGLUT3 neurons), are reciprocally activated by changes in energy balance and that modulating their activity has opposite effects on feeding—DRNVgat neurons increase, whereas DRNVGLUT3 neurons suppress, food intake,” write the investigators. “Furthermore, modulation of these neurons in obese (ob/ob) mice suppresses food intake and body weight and normalizes locomotor activity.
“Finally, using molecular profiling, we identify druggable targets in these neurons and show that local infusion of agonists for specific receptors on these neurons has potent effects on feeding. These data establish the DRN as an important node controlling energy balance.”
"Obesity is generally associated with leptin resistance," says Jeffrey Friedman, M.D., Ph.D., Marilyn M. Simpson Professor and head of Rockefeller's laboratory of molecular genetics. "And our recent data suggest that modulation of the activity of specific neurons with drugs could bypass leptin resistance and provide a new means for reducing body weight."
Alexander Nectow, who completed his Ph.D. in Dr. Friedman’s lab, and colleagues focused on the DRN when whole-brain imaging made with iDISCO, an advanced technique developed at Rockefeller, revealed that this part of the brain becomes activated in hungry mice. Subsequent imaging of other mice that were fed more than their normal amount of food, until they were full, revealed a different pattern of DRN activity.
