“Decreased cerebellar function, causing schizophrenia… “Proposing the possibility of customized treatment”
schizophrenia. Getty Images Bank
Schizophrenia is a disease that mainly presents symptoms such as delusions, auditory hallucinations, disorganized language and behavior, and emotional bluntness, and may cause disturbances in social functioning. It is known that about 1% of the world’s population suffers from this disease.
A Korean research team has discovered a new genetic cause and mechanism of these schizophrenia patients.
This is expected to serve as a basis for finding new treatment options for schizophrenia.
The National Research Foundation of Korea announced on the 15th that a research team led by Professor Ahn Ji-in of Sungkyunkwan University College of Medicine suggested a new causative gene for cerebellar shrinkage in patients with schizophrenia and identified the basic principle.
Although many studies have been conducted on the cerebral part of schizophrenia so far, there have been continuous reports that the cerebellum is particularly small as a result of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) analysis of patients with schizophrenia.
Since then, the association between cerebellar dysfunction and developmental mental illness has been steadily raised, but research on the cause and treatment of the disease is still insignificant.
Therefore, the research team removed Ebp1 from the neurons of mice, paying attention to the discovery of Ebp1 gene mutations in patients with schizophrenia.
After observation, the cerebellum was not formed normally, such as a 20% decrease in size.
Perkinsian cells, an important neuron in the cerebellum, were reduced by 50%.
It also confirmed the fact that schizophrenia symptoms as well as synaptic disruption and decreased mobility that transmit messages between neurons were confirmed.
The research team then injected Ebp1 wild-type and schizophrenic patient-derived mutants into the embryonic cerebellum of Ebp1-deficient mice in utero in time for cerebellar development.
As a result of observing schizophrenia symptoms and motility in mice born afterward, the Ebp1 wild-type showed improved pathological symptoms and motility, but the mutant-injected mice still showed schizophrenic symptoms.
Professor Ahn said, “We confirmed that Ebp1 mutation is a new genetic factor for schizophrenia and that decreased cerebellar function can cause schizophrenia. It suggests the possibility of customized treatment.”
The results of this study were published online in the international scientific journal ‘Molecular Psychiatry’.
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