Axon Guidance Molecules Implicated in Early-Onset Obesity.

Maternal nutritional status and the early growth rates of offspring influence the development of the melanocortin system and later susceptibility to metabolic dysregulation, but it is difficult to assess causality. A recent study by van der Klaauw et al. (Cell 2019;176:729-742) provides direct evidence that disrupting systems regulating neuronal circuit formation leads to early-onset obesity in zebrafish, mouse, and humans.
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