Study M149
Study name | Wurfel BE 2017 |
Title | Serum kynurenic acid is reduced in affective psychosis |
Overall design | Major depressive disorder (MDD) is hypothesized to be causally associated with an imbalance in the kynurenine pathway, with an increased metabolism down the 3-hydroxykynurenine (3HK) branch of the pathway leading to increased levels of the neurotoxic metabolite, quinolinic acid (QA), which is a putative Nmethyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) receptor agonist. In this study, the authors presented results that challenge the model of excess KynA production in affective psychosis. A LC-MS-based metabolomics method was applied to the serum of MDD patients and healthy controls. Tryptophan, kynurenine, kynurenic acid, quinolinic acid, and 3-hydroxykynurenine were analyzed. The study included 127 participants from 2 groups: (1) control group (n = 92), and (2) MDD group (n = 35). |
Study Type | Type1; |
Data available | Unavailable |
Organism | Human; |
Categories of depression | Depressive disorder; Depression; Depression; |
Criteria for depression | DSM-IV diagnosed MDD |
Sample size | 127 |
Tissue | Peripheral; Blood; Serum; |
Platform | MS-based; LC-MS: high-performance liquid chromatography with tandem mass spectrometry (MS/MS); |
PMID | |
DOI | |
Citation | Wurfel BE, Drevets WC, Bliss SA, et al. Serum kynurenic acid is reduced in affective psychosis. Transl Psychiatry 2017; 7(5):e1115. |
Metabolite |
