Current Molecular Medicine - Volume 15, Issue 2, 2015

Psychiatric disorders are caused not only by genetic factors but also by complicated factors such as environmental ones. Moreover, environmental factors are rarely quantitated as biological and biochemical indicators, making it extremely difficult to understand the pathological conditions of psychiatric disorders as well as their underlying pathogenic mechanisms. Additionally, we have actually no other option but to perform b Read More

Impaired DNA damage repair is a common pathological endophenotype of some types of neurodegenerative diseases, intellectual disabilities, and psychiatric diseases. Dysfunctional DNA repair and DNA damage, including DNA double-stranded breaks, are linked to transcriptional dysfunction and abnormal DNA methylation. Impaired DNA repair in neural stem cells leads to microcephaly or cerebellar ataxia. Furthermore, DNA Read More

Human genetic data on psychiatric disorders repeatedly demonstrate the involvement of various genes that are associated with neural development and neurogenesis. Neurogenesis is a biological process that is critical in brain development and continues throughout life. Neurogenesis is a multi-step process starting from the division of neural stem cells/progenitor cells, leading to self-renewal and simultan Read More

Methodologies for generating functional neuronal cells directly from human fibroblasts [induced neuronal (iN) cells] have been recently developed, but the research so far has only focused on technical refinements or recapitulation of known pathological phenotypes. A critical question is whether this novel technology will contribute to elucidation of novel disease mechanisms or evaluation of therapeutic strategies. Here we have a Read More

Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) and Schizophrenia (SCZ) are cognitive disorders with complex genetic architectures but overlapping behavioral phenotypes, which suggests common pathway perturbations. Multiple lines of evidence implicate imbalances in excitatory and inhibitory activity (E/I imbalance) as a shared pathophysiological mechanism. Thus, understanding the molecular underpinnings of E/I imbalance may provi de Read More

Imaging genetics is an integrated research method that uses neuroimaging and genetics to assess the impact of genetic variation on brain function and structure. Imaging genetics is both a tool for the discovery of risk genes for psychiatric disorders and a strategy for characterizing the neural systems affected by risk gene variants to elucidate quantitative and mechanistic aspects of brain function implicated in psychiatric disea Read More

Aberrant function of glutamatergic pathways is likely to underlie the pathology of schizophrenia. Evidence of oxidative stress in the disease pathology has also been reported. N-Acetylaspartate (NAA) is metabolically linked to both cascades and may be a key marker in exploring the interconnection of glutamatergic pathways and oxidative stress. Several studies have reported positive correlation between the levels of Read More

Pain consists of sensory-discriminative and negative-affective components. Neuronal mechanisms for the sensory component of pain have been investigated extensively. On the other hand, neuronal mechanisms for the affective component of pain remain to be investigated. Recent behavioral studies have revealed the brain regions and neuronal mechanisms involved in the affective component of pain. Glutamatergi Read More