Table 1.

Data establishing the link between pathological/normal anxiety and oxidative cell pathways and mechanisms

Subjects		Expression of antioxidant genes	Indirect evaluation of oxygen-derived species Activity of antioxidant proteins	Lipid peroxidation markers	Direct evaluation of oxygen-derived species Intracellular ROS levels assessed by using the 2′,7′-dichlorofluorescin diacetate (DCFH-DA) sensor
Pathological anxiety	Patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder and panic disorder Vs. healthy controls (Kuloglu et al.13,14)	-	In erthrocytes: Superoxide dismutase*, catalase, glutathione peroxidase*	In plasma: Malondialdehyde*	-
Normal trait-anxiety	Mouse strains with high- Vs. low-anxiety-related phenotypes (Hovatta et al.25)	In brain:Glyoxalase 1* and glutathione reductase 1*	In brain: Glyoxalase 1* and glutathione reductase 1*	-	-
	Anxious Vs. non-anxious Swiss albino mice (Rammal et al.41,42)	-	-	-	In brain and peripheral cells: Neurones*, glial cells*, granulocytes*, monocytes* and lymphocytes*

^*significantly different from controls (healthy humans, strains with low-anxiety-related phenotypes, non anxious mice).