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Imaging Study Suggests Diversity in Depression

Jon-Kar Zubieta

On the left, the colorful areas show where serotonin receptor levels were much lower in people with severe depression, compared with non-depressed people. On the right, the areas where severely depressed and less-depressed people differed.

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Published: May 14, 2008

When it comes to the receptor regions in the brain, not all episodes of depression are create equal.

At last week's annual meeting of the American Psychiatric Association, researchers at the University of Michigan reported that people suffering from depression may have far fewer molecules that get signals from the brain's "feel-good" stress-response chemicals than people who aren't depressed.

In addition, based on positron-emission tomography studies, Dr. Jon-Kar Zubieta and his U-M colleagues have concluded that the number of these feel-good receptor molecules in the brain influences how well depressed people might respond to anti-depressant medications.

Still, even among people afflicted with depression, there can be significant differences in the number of receptors present in the brain, the U-M team found.

The findings of his team's studies back findings other researchers have made in recent years, Zubieta said.

"The more we can understand about these differences, the better we can address treatment to the individual and have the greatest effect on symptoms," Zubieta said.

The researchers used a tracer and PET scans to reveal the location and concentration of one receptor molecule in the brain. The receptor molecule, dubbed 5HT1a, allows brain cells to receive signals from serotonin.

Serotonin is one of the feel-good chemical neurotransmitter produced by the brain.

In the study, 5HT1a receptor concentrations were markedly lower in depressed people compared with non-depressed people, in both the left and right hippocampus regions of the brain. Research has suggested a link between problems in the hippocampus and depression.

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