As someone with depression and also with a somewhat basic knowledge of how the brain works, I am not excited. This isn’t as big as it could be. Ending the biochemical cascade that ends in stress? Probably not a good idea. This probably isn’t the only protein receptor involved in stress, anxiety, and depression, in fact it most certainly isn’t, but for it to have been identified, it’s probably a major one. And blocking a major contributor to a stress reaction is probably not a good idea. Stress and anxiety, believe it or not, are healthy, adaptive states. It’s when stress and anxiety are prolonged or irrational that it results in problems. I don’t think anybody should be looking at designing a treatment to end this biochemical cascade when stress and anxiety are things that we are supposed to feel, can be healthy in some circumstances. It’s obviously early days in this research, it was only published in Nature on July 17, but the only way this is going to be a viable treatment option is if they can somehow figure out how to block the receptor in some cases and not all of the time. Otherwise, are we all just going to end up never feeling stressed, anxious, or depressed? As much as a miracle cure would be lovely, I envision more problems than solutions with this idea. Of course, I have a very limited understanding, and I could be completely off topic. I only read the news article, not the journal article. I’m not even sure I could understand it if I could get my hands on a copy of Nature (have you ever read a neuropsychological paper? I have, they’re complex). I do hope, of course, that heaps of further research will be done, and that it does lead to something that could help. I just don’t think that it will be the miracle cure that the news article seems to portray that it might be. Yes, it’s a huge find, a very important find, but not the be all end all.
It would be good if they can not necessarily block the receptor but maybe inhibit it so the reaction caused is not as bad.
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