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Leptin and Leptin Receptor

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  • First Online:
Encyclopedia of Signaling Molecules

Synonyms

Leptin [LEP; Leptin; Leptin (murine obesity homolog); Leptin (obesity homolog, mouse); OB; Obese protein; Obese, mouse, homolog of; Obesity factor; OBS].

Leptin receptor [CD295; DB; HuB219; LEP-R; LEPR; Leptin receptor; OB receptor; OB-R; OBR].

Historical Background

People long believed that obesity is entirely behavioral (e.g., lack of willpower) and not physiological. This dogma was first challenged with the identification of two obese mouse strains. The ob/ob mouse had been discovered in 1950 and characterized as the first model for massive obesity, marked hyperphagia, and mild transient diabetes. In 1965, a new obesity mutant had been discovered: the db/db mouse. Besides the marked obesity and hyperphagia, and unlike the ob/obmutant, these animals develop severe, life-shortening diabetes. The phenotypes suggested that the genes are involved in a common metabolic pathway. When a wild type mouse was parabioticaly paired (surgically joining of the bloodstream of two...

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Medical Biotechnology Center, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, Flanders Institute for Biotechnology, Ghent University, A. Baertsoenkaai 3, 9000, Ghent, Belgium

    Lennart Zabeau, Frank Peelman & Jan Tavernier

Authors
  1. Lennart Zabeau
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  2. Frank Peelman
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  3. Jan Tavernier
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Jan Tavernier .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Dept. Biological Science, Department of Molecular Science and Tech College of Natural Science, Suwon, Korea (Republic of)

    Sangdun Choi

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Zabeau, L., Peelman, F., Tavernier, J. (2016). Leptin and Leptin Receptor. In: Choi, S. (eds) Encyclopedia of Signaling Molecules. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-6438-9_101679-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-6438-9_101679-1

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  • Online ISBN: 978-1-4614-6438-9

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