Sugar-sweetened beverage consumption and incident depression: an exploratory multi-omics analysis of candidate biological mediators
Zhirong Li, Yating Miao, Ting Yu, Lina Jin, Yanan Ma, Xinyao Zhang · 2026
Read Sugar-sweetened beverage consumption and incident depression: an exploratory multi-omics analysis of candidate biological mediators by Zhirong Li, Yating Miao, Ting Yu, Lina Jin, Yanan Ma, Xinyao Zhang (2026) in the Tower of Babel, a free online library of public-domain works preserved in clean, searchable text. No sign-up. The full text is served as a plain-text file at a predictable URL, where text is present: https://antarctic-labs.com/tower-of-babel/PMC13563820.txt.
Description
Zhirong Li and five colleagues ask what biology might connect sugary drinks to later depression. The link has appeared in population data, but the middle steps are guesswork. Their 2026 study followed 192,045 UK Biobank participants, relating sweetened drink intake to new depression diagnoses over time. Three datasets, from American surveys and a Chinese school health study, checked the direction of the result. Blood proteins, metabolites, inflammation markers, and brain scan features were screened as statistical go-betweens.
Heavy drinkers faced an 18 percent higher risk of developing depression than non-drinkers, and the datasets leaned the same way. A signature of 229 blood proteins tied both to the drinks and to the risk. Mediation screening nominated 72 proteins, 36 metabolites, and 5 inflammatory markers, with an interleukin-related protein showing the strongest share at 9.6 percent. The authors label all of it exploratory: candidate pathways for experiments, not proof that soda works through them.
Catalog record
| CREATOR | Zhirong Li, Yating Miao, Ting Yu, Lina Jin, Yanan Ma, Xinyao Zhang |
|---|---|
| YEAR | 2026 |
| COLLECTION | PAPERS |
| FORMAT | TXT |
| FILE SIZE | 52151 |
| LICENSE | https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0 |
| RIGHTS | CC BY |
| SOURCE | Europe PMC |