Cited by 12Treatment of Major DepressionPhysical Activity and HealthTryptophan and brain disorders

Neurological mechanism-based analysis of the role and characteristics of physical activity in the improvement of depressive symptoms

Wang, Nan, Zhu, Shanshan, Chen, Shuyang, Zou, Ju, Zeng, Peng, Tan, Sijie·2025·Reviews in the Neurosciences

Abstract

Depression is a common mental disorder characterized by a high prevalence and significant adverse effects, making the searching for effective interventions an urgent priority. In recent years, physical activity (PA) has increasingly been recognized as a standard adjunctive treatment for mental disorders owing to its low cost, easy application, and high efficiency. Epidemiological data shows positive preventive and therapeutic effects of PA on mental illnesses such as depression. This article systematically describes the prophylactic and therapeutic effects of PA on depression and its biological basis. A comprehensive literature analysis reveals that PA significantly improves depressive symptoms by upregulating the expression of "exerkines" such as irisin, adiponectin, and BDNF to positively impacting neuropsychiatric conditions. In particular, lactate could also play a critical role in the ameliorating effects of PA on depression due to the findings about protein lactylation as a novel protein post-transcriptional modification. The literature also suggests that in terms of brain structure, PA may improve hippocampal volume, basal ganglia (neostriatum, caudate-crustal nucleus) and PFC density in patients with MDD. In summary, this study elucidates the multifaceted positive effects of PA on depression and its potential biological mechanisms with a particular emphasis on the roles of various exerkines. Future research may further investigate the effects of different types, intensities, and durations of PA on depression, as well as how to better integrate PA interventions into existing treatment strategies to achieve optimal outcomes in mental health interventions.

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.1515/revneuro-2024-0147

Cites

296 of 296 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Recomputing p-values needs the paper’s full text.

Claims the paper makes

This paper’s full text isn’t openly available, so its claims and self-check weren’t run. The registry and citation checks still apply.

Claims other papers make about this one

Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?

  • Increased intracellular lactate elevates histone lactylation, suggesting that Kla acts as a metabolically sensitive epigenetic signal.

    “Increased intracellular lactate, such as during mitochondrial respiratory inhibition, elevates histone lactylation, suggesting that Kla acts as a metabolically sensitive epigenetic signal (Wang et al., 2025).”
  • ATAC-seq detects chromatin accessibility changes associated with stress or disease states.

    “ChIP-seq reveals genome-wide distributions of histone modifications and regulatory elements (Nakato and Sakata, 2021), whereas ATAC-seq detects chromatin accessibility changes associated with stress or disease states (Wang et al., 2025).”

Cites

1 retracted

Flagged first, then by citations

Cited by

Sorted by citations

Authors
Wang, N., Zhu, S., Chen, S., Zou, J., Zeng, P., & Tan, S.
Affiliations
  • University of South China (CN)
  • China Academy of Chinese Medical Sciences (CN)
Corresponding author
Tan, Sijie
Venue
Reviews in the Neurosciences
Published
2025-01-21
Volume
36
Issue
5
Pages
455-478
ISSN
  • 0334-1763 (ISSN-L)
  • 2191-0200
OpenAlex
W4406627671
Cited by
12
References
296
Citations by year
2026: 8 · 2025: 4
FWCI
1.63
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
closed
Locations
  • Reviews in the Neurosciences (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
Funders
  • Hunan Provincial Natural Science Foundation (2023JJ30504)
  • Jiangxi Provincial Natural Science Foundation (20242BAB25472)
  • Hunan Education Department (22A0311)
  • The Science and Technology Innovation Project for College Students of Hunan Province (S202310555219 (Zhang Yun,), 461 (Xu Heng))
  • Hubei Key Laboratory for Kidney Disease Pathogenesis (2023SB101)
Topics
  • Health Sciences › Medicine › Pharmacology › Treatment of Major Depression
  • Health Sciences › Medicine › Physiology › Physical Activity and Health
  • Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Biological Psychiatry › Tryptophan and brain disorders
Keywords
physical activity, depression, major depressive disorder, exerkines, irisin, adiponectin, brain-derived neurotrophic factor, lactate, lactylation, hippocampal volume, basal ganglia, prefrontal cortex, neuroplasticity, adjunctive therapy
MeSH terms
Animals, Brain, Depression, Exercise Therapy, Humans, Exercise

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review