Interrelation of Major Depression and Antidepressant Transcriptomics

Over the last decade, major depressive disorder (MDD) has attracted great attention in the Western societies for mainly two reasons. First, epidemiological studies demonstrate a steady increase in the number of affected patients so that MDD will be one of the most disabling conditions worldwide in the near future. Second, preclinical and clinical science has early recognized the need for elaborating the cause and progression of MDD in order to improve treatment strategies. Progress in developing advanced technologies such as DNA microarrays and next-generation sequencing has allowed for rapidly acquiring detailed biochemical information about DNA polymorphisms and transcriptome profiles. These studies collectively show profound biochemical changes in affected individuals, and animal studies partly corroborate or complement the alterations identified in patients. In this review, we survey transcriptional changes in the course of MDD and the effects of antidepressant drugs on multiple disease-related transcriptional pathways. The combination of both potentially unravels additional mechanisms of disease aetiology which eventually represents a bottom-up approach for the discovery of newly-acting antidepressant drugs.