中文摘要：

抑郁症是当今社会常见的精神情感障碍性疾病,发病率逐年上升,严重危害人类身心健康.近年来,中药柴胡在临床抗抑郁治疗中应用广泛,疗效显著.对其药理的研究也有了诸多新发现,包括柴胡类复方制剂、柴胡提取物和有效成分柴胡皂苷的抗抑郁研究等,多涉及神经、免疫和内分泌系统,单胺类神经递质、神经元形态活性及其信号通路已成为研究热点,从而为临床用药提供了更多科学依据、为新药研发提供了理论基础.

英文摘要：

Depression is one of common psychotic affective disorders with increasing incidence every year and serious harms on human＇s health. In recent years, the herbal bupleurum has been used more and more widely in depression treatments with obvious therapeutic effects. There are many new findings in anti-depression pharmacological studies on bupleurum, including the compound prescription, extract and active ingredient. It is found out the nervous,immune and endocrine systems are anti-depression targets of bupleu-rum compound, bupleurum extraction and saikosaponin. More and more anti-depression pharmacological stud- ies of bupleurum are focused on monoamine neurotransmitter, neuron morphology, activity and cell signaling pathways, which have provided scientific basis for clinical therapy and clues for new drug research.