سازوکار نقش و احتمالات Sirt1 در افسردگی Role and Possible Mechanisms of Sirt1 in Depression

1. Depression Depression, also known as depressive disorder, is caused by a variety of factors, and its main symptoms are psychological or emotional disorders. Depression is a chronic and lifethreatening mental disorder, affecting almost 350 million people worldwide and places a huge burden on both individuals and families [1, 2]. Moreover, depression could be lethal due to the possibility of suicide [3]. Depression can also increase risks of cardiac dysfunction, cerebrovascular disease, and other underlying mechanisms of mortality. There are several ways of classification of depression. According to the severity of symptoms, depression can be divided into mild depression and major depressive disorder (MDD), or according to the timing of symptoms, it can be divided into acute depression and chronic depression. As the etiology of depression involves a variety of physiological and psychological factors, it is hard to treat this disease. Antidepressants are the primary means of treating depression, and amitriptyline and sertraline are mainly used for this disease. While it is known that antidepressant medications exhibit side effects and come with safety concerns, withdrawal of the medications could also be very difficult. Therefore, any use of medication requires close monitoring. Psychological therapy is also an effective treatment for clinical depression and may prevent a person with mild depression from becoming more severely depressed, but the effect is subject to many factors. In addition to antidepressants and psychological therapy, electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) and vagus nerve stimulation (VNS) are also new solutions for depression, although more efficient, they also have significant adverse effects including retrograde amnesia [4]. All of these depression treatments are thought to be effective; however, these treatments take time, and recovery usually has its ups and downs. Furthermore, the same treatment may have different effects for different patients. In the past few decades, people have explored a variety of molecules, cells, and signaling pathways involved in depression, but the pathogenesis of depression still remains to be elucidated. Because of complicated causes and limited treatments, depression is still one of the scary diseases for humans. Indeed, numerous researchers have focused on the genetic study of depression and found some potential gene targets. Sirt1 is one of these genes.