A new study conducted at the University of Maryland school of medicine suggests that the cause of depression may be different from what we originally thought it was. Depression is a widespread problem in our society that continues to grow. Depression is thought to be caused by a lack of Serotonin which is a brain chemical that makes us happy. In this study, scientists exposed rats to stressful conditions similar to the ones that cause depression in humans. The researchers noticed behaviors that told them the rats were depressed. However, when the researchers looked at the brains of the rats, the serotonin levels were the same as they were at the beginning of the experiment. This lead to the discovery that serotonin is also used to strenghten communications between brain cells. Therefore, depression might actually be caused by lack of communication between brain cells. If this is true, depression medications would need to be altered to fix the communication problems rather than boosting the level of serotonin.
I found this article really interesting. It in unbelievable that we might have been treating depression wrong for a long time. I am exicited to see where this goes in the future.
NOS Themes:
Role of motivation and curiousity: The scientists were curious as to whether or not a lack of serotonin causes depression.
Science is based on evidence: The researchers backed up their claims with evidence that the rats were depressed and they still had normal levels of serotonin.
Importance of Repeatabilty: It is important that more experiments like this are conducted to verify these claims before we start altering depression medications.
My article: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/03/130318105329.htm
Further reading: http://health.nytimes.com/health/guides/symptoms/depression/overview.html
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/232248.php
I thought your article was really interesting and I can't believe depression may have been mistreated for so long! The first link below gives some more background info about what causes depression, and depression in families. The second link tells about the problems in depression medications, which relates to your article, about how depression medications may have to be altered.
ReplyDeleteLink 1: http://well.wvu.edu/articles/the_biology_of_depression
Link 2:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dr-mark-hyman/depression-medication-why_b_550098.html
Your article was very intriguing to me Jordan, because I have had some family members in the past who have been diagnosed with depression! It is hard to believe that depression may have been mistreated for so long! I was so fascinated by your article that I looked up another article called, "Depression Could be an Evolutionary Byproduct of the Immune System" by Emory University and it explains how for decades, some researchers have seen links between depression and inflammation of the immune system. I have never heard of this link between depression and inflammation of the immune system, but it was very fascinating to read about what these researchers have found! It is interesting to read a different view point of what another cause of depression could be other than serotonin deficiency and lack of communication between brain cells!
ReplyDeleteLink: http://www.biologynews.net/archives/2012/03/01/depression_could_be_evolutionary_byproduct_of_immune_system.html