POMC and obesity due to melanocortin 4 receptor deficiency: In accordance with this aspect, it has been shown that the disruption of the POMC and melanocortin receptor 4 (MC4R) genes in mice models causes obesity (Huszar et al., 1997; Yaswen et al., 1999), while MC3R gene-deficient mice have normal food consumption but accumulate fat (Chen et al., 2000).