Friday, November 29, 2019

Brain Tissue Reveals Sex-specific Gene Changes in Depression

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https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/321245.php#1

Related Article:
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/03/180313130643.htm

Major depression is a mental health disorder where depressive symptoms continue for at least 2 weeks. A study was done in which researchers analyzed brain tissue of 26 deceased adult men and 24 adult women who had major depression. They specifically searched for genetic alterations across the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, subgenual anterior cingulate cortex, and basolateral amygdala, all of which are implicated in depression. The study reported 706 genes expressed differently in men with severe depression and 882 genes expressed differently in women with the disorder. The researchers also note that the different brain regions are unique to the opposing changes in gene expression.

I thought that this article was cool because special medications could be created specifically for each sex for the most effective results. Sometimes antidepressants are not effective for certain people so I hope that this study will become useful for them.

3 comments:

  1. This is really interesting. I would have expected all of the differences to be located around the pituitary gland rather than being spread out across the brain. It is even stranger that the regions affected change between genders. I guess it is probably related to hormone levels.

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  2. What is most intriguing about this article is that the the genes that were changed in both genders were changed in opposite ways. Perhaps it has something to do with testosterone versus estrogen within their body, or the different ways that society affects/interacts with the two genders.

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  3. The most fascinating part of this is he varying brain regions between genders. I think this is probably due to the differences in hormones being released in both males and females. I also find women have more genes found to be expressed differently when it comes to depression in comparison to men.

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