Journal
PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
Volume 116, Issue 27, Pages 13670-13679Publisher
NATL ACAD SCIENCES
DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1901795116
Keywords
leptin; food intake; corticosterone; obesity; AgRP neurons
Categories
Funding
- US Public Health Service [R01 DK-113984, P30 DK-059635, T32 DK-101019, K99/R00 CA-215315, R01 NS-087568, UL1TR000142, T32 DK-007058, R01 DK-075632, R01 DK-089044, R01 DK-096010, R01 DK-111401, K99/R00 HL-144923, P30 DK-046200, P30 DK-057521]
- AstraZeneca
- Naomi Berrie Diabetes Center
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Leptin informs the brain about sufficiency of fuel stores. When insufficient, leptin levels fall, triggering compensatory increases in appetite. Falling leptin is first sensed by hypothalamic neurons, which then initiate adaptive responses. With regard to hunger, it is thought that leptin-sensing neurons work entirely via circuits within the central nervous system (CNS). Very unexpectedly, however, we now show this is not the case. Instead, stimulation of hunger requires an intervening endocrine step, namely activation of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenocortical (HPA) axis. Increased corticosterone then activates AgRP neurons to fully increase hunger. Importantly, this is true for 2 forms of low leptin-induced hunger, fasting and poorly controlled type 1 diabetes. Hypoglycemia, which also stimulates hunger by activating CNS neurons, albeit independently of leptin, similarly recruits and requires this pathway by which HPA axis activity stimulates AgRP neurons. Thus, HPA axis regulation of AgRP neurons is a previously underappreciated step in homeostatic regulation of hunger.
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