Abstract
Major depressive disorder (MDD) is a severe and chronic psychiatric disorder with a high prevalence in the population. Although our understanding of its pathophysiological mechanisms has significantly increased over the years, available treatments still present several limitations and are not effective to all MDD patients. Epigenetic mechanisms have recently been suggested to play key roles in MDD pathogenesis and treatment, including the effects of small noncoding RNAs known as microRNAs (miRNAs). miRNAs can modulate gene expression posttranscriptionally by interfering with the stability and translation of messenger RNA molecules and are also known to cross-talk with other epigenetic mechanisms. In this review, we will summarize and discuss recent findings of alterations in miRNAs in tissues of patients with MDD and evidence of treatment-induced effects in these molecules.
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Acknowledgments
The Translational Psychiatry Program (USA) is funded by the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, McGovern Medical School, the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UTHealth). The Center of Excellence on Mood Disorders (USA) is funded by the Pat Rutherford Jr. Chair in Psychiatry, John S. Dunn Foundation, and Anne and Don Fizer Foundation Endowment for Depression Research. Translational Psychiatry Laboratory (Brazil) is one of the centers of the National Institute for Molecular Medicine (INCT-MM) and one of the members of the Center of Excellence in Applied Neurosciences of Santa Catarina (NENASC). Its research is supported by grants from CNPq, FAPESC, Instituto Cérebro e Mente, and UNESC.
J.Q. is a 1A CNPq Research Fellow.
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Fries, G.R., Zhang, W., Benevenuto, D., Quevedo, J. (2019). MicroRNAs in Major Depressive Disorder. In: Guest, P. (eds) Reviews on Biomarker Studies in Psychiatric and Neurodegenerative Disorders. Advances in Experimental Medicine and Biology(), vol 1118. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-05542-4_9
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