Open Life Sciences (Aug 2020)

Neuroanatomy of melanocortin-4 receptor pathway in the mouse brain

  • Wang Kun,
  • Mao Wei,
  • Zhang Xiaoyu,
  • Zhao Yufei,
  • Fan Kuikui,
  • Pan Deng,
  • Liu Haodong,
  • Li Penghui,
  • Hai Rihan,
  • Du Chenguang

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1515/biol-2020-0063
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 15, no. 1
pp. 580 – 587

Abstract

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Melanocortin-4 receptors (MC4Rs) are key regulators of energy homeostasis and adipose deposition in the central nervous system. Considering that MC4R expression regions and function-related research mainly focus on the paraventricular nucleus (PVN), little is known about their distribution throughout the mouse brain, although its messenger RNA distribution has been analyzed in the rat. Therefore, MC4R protein localization in mouse neurons was the focus of this study.

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