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Scientists generally believe that most antidepressants use pathways involving either the serotonin or the norepinephrine system. In this study, the authors bred norepinephrine-deficient mice by disrupting the dopamine β-hydroxylase gene (DBH-deficient mice), and subjected them and their littermates (controls) to various antidepressants and the tail suspension test (TST), one of the most used and sensitive animal models to predict antidepressant properties. The eight tested antidepressants (bupropion, citalopram, desipramine, fluoxetine, pargyline, paroxetine, reboxetine, and sertraline) have varied effects on serotonin and norepinephrine.
When treated with saline, controls and DBH-deficient mice had similar results on the TST. All antidepres…