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Central noradrenaline transporter availability in highly obese, non-depressed individuals

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European Journal of Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Purpose

The brain noradrenaline (NA) system plays an important role in the central nervous control of energy balance and is thus implicated in the pathogenesis of obesity. The specific processes modulated by this neurotransmitter which lead to obesity and overeating are still a matter of debate.

Methods

We tested the hypothesis that in vivo NA transporter (NAT) availability is changed in obesity by using positron emission tomography (PET) and S,S-[11C]O-methylreboxetine (MRB) in twenty subjects comprising ten highly obese (body mass index BMI > 35 kg/m2), metabolically healthy, non-depressed individuals and ten non-obese (BMI < 30 kg/m2) healthy controls.

Results

Overall, we found no significant differences in binding potential (BPND) values between obese and non-obese individuals in the investigated brain regions, including the NAT-rich thalamus (0.40 ± 0.14 vs. 0.41 ± 0.18; p = 0.84) though additional discriminant analysis correctly identified individual group affiliation based on regional BPND in all but one (control) case. Furthermore, inter-regional correlation analyses indicated different BPND patterns between both groups but this did not survive testing for multiple comparions.

Conclusions

Our data do not find an overall involvement of NAT changes in human obesity. However, preliminary secondary findings of distinct regional and associative patterns warrant further investigation.

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Acknowledgements

The work is supported by the IFB Adiposity Diseases, Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), Germany, FKZ: 01E01001 (http://www.bmbf.de). Results of the study were partially presented at the 29th World Congress of The International College of Neuropsychopharmacology, 2014, in Vancouver, Canada, and at the 26th Annual Congress of the European Association of Nuclear Medicine, 2013, Lyon, France.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Nuclear Medicine, University of Leipzig, Liebigstraße 18, 04103, Leipzig, Germany

    Swen Hesse, Georg-Alexander Becker, Michael Rullmann, Anke Bresch, Julia Luthardt, Marianne Patt, Philipp M. Meyer & Osama Sabri

  2. Integrated Treatment and Research Centre (IFB) Adiposity Diseases, Leipzig University Medical Centre, Leipzig, Germany

    Swen Hesse, Michael Rullmann, Mohammed K. Hankir, Franziska Zientek, Georg Reißig, S. Baldofski, Mathias Fasshauer, Wiebke K. Fenske, Michael Stumvoll, Anja Hilbert & Osama Sabri

  3. Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany

    Michael Rullmann & Katrin Arelin

  4. Day Clinic for Cognitive Neurology, University of Leipzig, Leipzig, Germany

    Katrin Arelin

  5. Department of Neuroradiology, University of Leipzig, Leipzig, Germany

    Donald Lobsien

  6. Department of Psychiatry and Behavioural and Clinical Neuroscience Institute, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK

    Ulrich Müller

  7. Department of Internal Medicine, University of Leipzig, Leipzig, Germany

    Matthias Blüher, Mathias Fasshauer & Michael Stumvoll

  8. Department of Medical Psychology and Medical Sociology, University of Leipzig, Leipzig, Germany

    S. Baldofski & Anja Hilbert

  9. Departments of Radiology and Psychiatry, New York University School of Medicine, New York, NY, USA

    Yu-Shin Ding

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  1. Swen Hesse
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  2. Georg-Alexander Becker
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  3. Michael Rullmann
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  4. Anke Bresch
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  8. Georg Reißig
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  12. Ulrich Müller
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  18. Michael Stumvoll
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  19. Anja Hilbert
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  20. Yu-Shin Ding
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  21. Osama Sabri
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Swen Hesse.

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Funding

This study was supported by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (FKZ: 01EO1001).

Conflict of interest

The authors declare no conflicts of interest directly related to the subject of this work.

Ethical approval

All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ICH Guideline for Good Clinical Practice (GCP) and with the 1964 Helsinki Declaration and its later amendments. The study was approved by the ethics committee of the Medical Faculty of the University of Leipzig (registered under the number 206-10-08032010) and the German Bundesamt für Strahlenschutz/Federal Office for Radiation Protection (number Z5-22461-2-2011-002), and registered at the European Clinical Trial Database (EudraCT 2012-000568-32) and the German Clinical Trials Register (DRKS).

Informed consent

Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

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Hesse, S., Becker, GA., Rullmann, M. et al. Central noradrenaline transporter availability in highly obese, non-depressed individuals. Eur J Nucl Med Mol Imaging 44, 1056–1064 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00259-016-3590-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00259-016-3590-3

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