Serotonergic Drugs for Treating Obesity

The prevalence of obesity is reaching pandemic proportions and novel therapies are urgently needed to reduce the risk for obesity-associated morbidities such as metabolic and cardiovascular disease and some malignancies. The brain is the master regulator of food intake and energy expenditure, the two major determinants of body weight. Studies in rodents and in humans provided convincing evidence that several neuronal circuits involved in the regulation of food intake are disturbed in obesity. Neurotransmitter signaling within these circuits became a pharmaceutical target for the treatment of obesity. Serotonergic pathways involved in the regulation of food intake are complex and contain multiple brain areas and different serotonin receptors. Brain serotonin signaling affects hedonic and homeostatic feeding and modulating serotonergic tone is an attractive therapeutic option. This chapter describes the role of the serotonergic system in the regulation of food intake and the pharmaceutical trajectories of serotonin-modulating drugs.