schizophrenia
A cannabis-like substance produced by the brain may dampen delusional or psychotic experiences, rather than trigger them. Heavy cannabis use has been linked to psychosis in the past, leading researchers to look for a connection between the brain's natural cannabinoid system and schizophrenia. Sure enough, when Markus Leweke of the University of Cologne, Germany, and Andrea Giuffrida and Danielle Piomelli of the University of California, Irvine, looked at levels of the natural cannabis-like substance anandamide, they were higher in people with schizophrenia than in healthy controls.
Researchers at the NIH's National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) have identified a relationship between a small section of one gene, the brain chemical messenger glutamate, and a collection of traits known to be associated with schizophrenia. The finding confirms the gene responsible for management of glutamate is a promising candidate in determining risk for schizophrenia. Glutamate is a key neurotransmitter long thought to play a role in schizophrenia.
A new study indicates that prenatal exposure to influenza may increase the risk for development of schizophrenia years later. The study evaluated archived sera from pregnant women, who participated in a large birth cohort from 1959-1966. The study has shown for the first time that serologically documented prenatal exposure to influenza is associated with schizophrenia. The risk of schizophrenia was increased threefold when influenza occurred during the first half of pregnancy; however when influenza occurred during the second half of pregnancy, no increased risk was observed.
Doctors are reporting some success in treating one of the most troubling symptoms of dementias such as Alzheimer's disease. A drug commonly used to treat schizophrenia and other psychotic disorders appears effective at reducing actions like screaming at or slapping caregivers -- agitated behaviors that occur in as many as half of patients.
The principal active ingredient in marijuana causes transient schizophrenia-like symptoms ranging from suspiciousness and delusions to impairments in memory and attention, according to a Yale research study. Lead author D. Cyril D'Souza, M.D., associate professor of psychiatry at Yale School of Medicine, said the study was an attempt to clarify a long known association between cannabis and psychosis in the hopes of finding another clue about the pathophysiology of schizophrenia.
An abnormal pattern in an area of the brain that governs hearing may be an accurate method of diagnosing schizophrenia, according to a study by Yale researchers and collaborators. "These results seem to point to a cardinal abnormality in schizophrenia," said Godfrey Pearlson, M.D., professor of psychiatry at Yale School of Medicine, director of the Olin Neurospychiatry Research Center at the Institute of Living in Hartford, and senior author of the study published in Biological Psychiatry. "Using this imaging test, we were able to identify patients with schizophrenia with 97 percent accuracy."
Researchers have found that a new generation of medications called "atypical antipsychotics" can significantly lower the risk of violent behavior in people with schizophrenia who are being treated in community-based centers. In a two-year study, the researchers found that patients who consistently took one of the newer medications had less than one-third the incidence of getting into fights or engaging in violent actions toward others, compared to subjects who consistently took one of the older antipsychotic medications.
Approximately 2 percent of Caucasians have a gene segment variation that can cause a certain form of schizophrenia. Most people with the variation, known as a polymorphism, do not have the disease. A University of Iowa Health Care study reveals a good prognosis for people who do have this form of schizophrenia. The team also found that this polymorphism is associated with overall benefits for human survival, and the initial mutation occurred in a single common ancestor about 100,000 years ago.
A protein involved in the release of neurotransmitters in the brain is essential to learning and memory in mice, researchers at UT Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas have found. A study published today in Neuron offers the first evidence that lack of this protein ? known as RIM1 alpha ? causes profound deficits in the learning process. The discovery is a major step in understanding the molecular events that underlie learning and memory ? complex processes that can be impaired in human neuropsychiatric disorders such as Alzheimer's disease, mental retardation and schizophrenia.
The reward mechanism involved in addiction appears to regulate lifelong social or pair bonds between monogamous mating animals, according to a Center for Behavioral Neuroscience (CBN) study of prairie voles published in the January 19 edition of the Journal of Comparative Neurology. The finding could have implications for understanding the basis of romantic love and disorders of the ability to form social attachments, such as autism and schizophrenia.
A mouse study reported in this week's Science magazine shows that three drugs, each acting on a different chemical transmitter in the brain, all produce the same schizophrenia-like symptoms by acting on a single "master molecule" in the brain. The findings, reported by researchers at Rockefeller University with collaboration from three pharmaceutical and biotech companies, provides, for the first time, a cellular model detailing how this crucial protein, known as DARPP-32, interacts with multiple neurotransmitter systems to produce behavior.
Your nose could provide the first reliable diagnostic tool for predicting a person's likelihood of developing psychosis, new research has found. A University of Melbourne team examined a group of people deemed to be at ultra high risk of developing psychosis and found those that went on to develop schizophrenia, rather than other forms of psychosis, all displayed the inability to identify smells. This deficit was present before the onset of any significant clinical symptoms of psychosis.
Patients with schizophrenia must take medication regularly to reduce their risk of relapse. But the disease impairs memory, according to an article published in BMC Psychiatry, meaning these patients may have difficulty in remembering to take their tablets. Habitual tasks, like taking medicine every few hours, rely on "prospective memory". This type of memory, which appears to be impaired by schizophrenia, enables you to remember that you have to do something in the future, without being prompted.
Researchers at the University of Alberta have discovered a genetic flaw in a family suffering with schizophrenia that may help to explain an important biochemical process implicated in the onset of the disease. Studying a British mother and daughter, the researchers discovered that both were found to have a "break" in a large gene on human chromosome 14, due to a rearranged chromosome.
Studies of a gene that affects how efficiently the brain's frontal lobes process information are revealing some untidy consequences of a tiny variation in its molecular structure and how it may increase susceptibility to schizophrenia. People with a common version of the gene associated with more efficient working memory and frontal lobe information processing may pay a penalty in adverse responses to amphetamine, in heightened anxiety and sensitivity to pain. Yet, another common version may slightly bias the brain toward a pattern of neurochemical activity associated with psychosis, report researchers at the National Institutes of Health (NIH).
