Serotonin
12” x 16”
Acrylic on canvas
2010
$300
Serotonin (also known, by those who prefer hyphenated acronyms to ordinary words, as 5-HT) is a neurotransmitter derived from the amino acid tryptophan, that is associated with mood, appetite, and that great catch-all, “some cognitive functions including memory and learning.” Serotonin is chiefly famous for its apparent role in depression, anxiety, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and phobias. Together, these make up some of the most common mental disorders, making serotonin a very important tool in mental health.
All of the earliest antidepressants, and most of those in use today, act to increase the levels of free serotonin, and consequently, have many of the same side effects. Because serotonin is found as a hormone in the gut, where it regulates the movement of the intestines, antidepressants that increase serotonin levels often result in nausea and diarrhea. Conversely, serotonin antagonists are some of the best anti-nausea drugs known.
It is thought that serotonin’s role in moderating mood could derive from its use in lower animals as a hormonal signifier of the presence of food. In social animals that have to compete for their food, injections of serotonin cause them to behave more aggressively, suggesting that serotonin causes animals to perceive that they are more dominant.
Serotonin is also associated with the action of psychedlic drugs, which appear to act mostly on the 5-HT2A receptor — although how this might account for their vaunted effects is still a mystery.
These molecules are rendered as space-filling models, in a natural, low-energy conformation, and displayed from an angle that shows off as much of their structure as possible. The atoms are color-coded, with carbon being black, hydrogen white, oxygen red, and nitrogen blue. They are painted in artist-quality acrylics, on gessoed canvas
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