Glycosylation and depression—a review

Abstract

The pathogenesis of depression remains unclear. Present diagnostic criteria for depression does not include any biological aspects. Although various serum and plasma proteins, such as neurotrophic factors and cytokines have been reported as candidate biomarkers of depression, these proteins have been analyzed only quantitatively. Moreover, a few clinical studies have been reported which consider glycosylation analysis in depression. Furthermore, a very few basic research work focus on analyzing glycans in case of depression. In this article, we review the recent findings in glycobiology, highlighting its potential as a biological marker of depression.