Anxiety can be created by the body, mouse heart study suggests

• NEWS
• 01 March 2023

Artificially raising a mouse’s heart rate leads to anxious behaviour.

1. Sara Reardon 1. Sara Reardon is a freelance journalist based in Bozeman, Montana.

Emotions such as fear and anxiety can make the heart beat faster. Now a study in mice has found that the reverse is also true — artificially increasing the heart rate can raise anxiety levels1.

References

1. Hsueh, B. et al. Nature https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-023-05748-8 (2023).

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2. Garfinkel, S. N. et al. J. Neurosci. 34, 13435–13443 (2014).

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