The genetic causes of depression have always accompanied the human being throughout its evolution, however, until now the exact biological foundations of its most severe aspect were unknown: clinical depression . Now, a team of scientists from China, Denmark, Germany, Japan, Saudi Arabia, the United Kingdom and the United States, coordinated by the expert Jonathan Flint of the University of Oxford (United Kingdom) has managed to shed some light on this very mental disorder. unknown and at the same time so frequent in our society.
Previous research had already suggested that genetics play an important role in the risk of depression , but when it comes to presenting data to confirm this hypothesis, the results have been quite unsuccessful in the genetic-depression association.
For this study, the scientists decided to take a different approach from those already investigated, focusing on 5,303 Chinese patients who had been diagnosed with acute depression . Examination of these cases revealed that there were two crucial areas, located on chromosome 10, precisely related to acute depressive disorder. Specifically, one of these areas is located near a gene called SIRT1 (responsible for the production of mitochondria, the small organs that nourish the cell with energy) and the other is an “intron” of the LHPP gene (which encodes a certain protein).
Despite the fact that this discovery represents a great advance for the understanding of depression , scientists do not rule out that there are more genes involved that have not yet been discovered .
The study has been published in the journal Nature .
