ArticleFrontiers in psychiatry2022
The role of leptin in indirectly mediating "somatic anxiety" symptoms in major depressive disorder.
Article in Frontiers in psychiatry, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 8 papers.
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Who cites it
8 citing papers in PubMed, 12 citations in OpenAlex.
- Cognition at the core of metabolic syndrome: linking metabolic load to behavioural impairment in a longitudinal high-fat diet rat model.Brain, behavior, & immunity - health · 2026Article
- Intermittent Fasting and Emotional Regulation: A Psychobiological Framework Integrating Metabolic, Neuroendocrine and Interoceptive Mechanisms.Nutrients · 2026Review
- Association of inflammation and serum adipocytokines with depression and anxiety burden in axial spondyloarthritis.Scientific reports · 2026Article
- Children and adolescents with psychiatric disorders have high relative leptin levels upon adjustment for sex, BMI, and pubertal status.European child & adolescent psychiatry · 2026Article
- Exploration of Early-Treatment-Associated Changes in Metabolic and Inflammatory Biomarkers in First-Episode Psychosis in Italian Patients.International journal of molecular sciences · 2026Article
- Web of Science-Based Visualization of Mapping Global Scientific Production on Epstein-Barr Virus-Associated Autoimmune Diseases: A Bibliometric Study.Health science reports · 2025Article
- Inflammatory status along the brain-liver axis in animals vulnerable to prenatal stress: sex-related implications for stress-induced comorbidities.Translational psychiatry · 2025Article
- Alterations in Adipokine Levels Are Associated with Human Perinatal Anxiety and Depression.Journal of clinical medicine · 2025Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
13 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Background: Leptin is a multifunctional hormone secreted from adipose tissue, which plays a core role in regulating energy intake and expenditure. Evidence has demonstrated that leptin receptors are located in brain areas involved in emotional processing, and major depressive disorder (MDD) is characterized by dysfunction of emotional processing. Taken together, these features suggest that leptin may play a potential role in the pathophysiology of MDD. However, the precise roles of leptin in modulating depressive symptoms in MDD remain unclear. Methods: Participants [18 drug-naïve MDD patients, 15 unaffected first-degree relatives of MDD patients (FDR-MDD), and 40 healthy controls] completed clinical assessments and provided blood samples for measurement of leptin levels. We evaluated the effect of leptin on clinical status (MDD or FDR-MDD) and symptomatic dimensionalities of MDD using mediation analysis. Results: We found that leptin was increased in MDD patients and this only predicted "somatic anxiety" symptoms. Furthermore, leptin was a significant and indirect mediator of the association between clinical status (MDD or FDR-MDD) and "somatic anxiety" symptoms. Conclusion: Our finding that leptin was a significant and indirect mediator of clinical status (MDD or FDR-MDD) and "somatic anxiety" symptoms suggests that leptin may indirectly affect somatic depressive symptoms in MDD. Our findings may provide a theoretical basis for novel clinical interventions in MDD.
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