Regulation of food intake and the development of anti-obesity drugs.

As the most significant cause of death worldwide, obesity has become one of the world's most important public health problems, but approved anti-obesity drugs are extremely limited. This article summarizes the feeding control circuits and regulators involved in obesity development, highlight the hypothalamus, melanocortin system and brain-gut peptide actions in this process, and the five US FDA approved anti-obesity medications in long term use, namely phentermine/topiramate, lorcaserin, naltrexone/bupropion, liraglutide and orlistat.