{"doi":"10.1038/s41398-024-02796-0","title":"The endogenous opioid system in the medial prefrontal cortex mediates ketamine’s antidepressant-like actions","abstract":"Recent studies have implicated the endogenous opioid system in the antidepressant actions of ketamine, but the underlying mechanisms remain unclear. We used a combination of pharmacological, behavioral, and molecular approaches in rats to test the contribution of the prefrontal endogenous opioid system to the antidepressant-like effects of a single dose of ketamine. Both the behavioral actions of ketamine and their molecular correlates in the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) are blocked by acute systemic administration of naltrexone, a competitive opioid receptor antagonist. Naltrexone delivered directly into the mPFC similarly disrupts the behavioral effects of ketamine. Ketamine treatment rapidly increases levels of β-endorphin and the expression of the μ-opioid receptor gene (Oprm1) in the mPFC, and the expression of gene that encodes proopiomelanocortin, the precursor of β-endorphin, in the hypothalamus, in vivo. Finally, neutralization of β-endorphin in the mPFC using a specific antibody prior to ketamine treatment abolishes both behavioral and molecular effects. Together, these findings indicate that presence of β-endorphin and activation of opioid receptors in the mPFC are required for the antidepressant-like actions of ketamine.","journal":"Translational Psychiatry","year":2024,"id":419719,"datarank":0.5533319181170905,"base_score":3.6888794541139363,"endowment":3.6888794541139363,"self_citation_contribution":0.5533319181170905,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.5533319181170905,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":39,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9501,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2024-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":885736,"name":"Ralph Dileone","orcid":"0000-0002-4770-2590","position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":284041,"name":"Christopher Pittenger","orcid":"0000-0003-2117-9321","position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":250557,"name":"Ronald S. Duman","orcid":"0000-0001-8690-8439","position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":249393,"name":"Cheng Jiang","orcid":"0000-0003-4583-3295","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":92,"raw_metadata":{"citation_network_status":"fetched"},"created_at":"2026-07-19T01:57:19.937291Z","pmid":"38346984","pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}