FAMILIAL PSYCHIATRIC DISORDERS & SCHIZOPHRENIA

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This subproject is one of many research subprojects utilizing the resources provided by a Center grant funded by NIH/NCRR. The subproject and investigator (PI) may have received primary funding from another NIH source, and thus could be represented in other CRISP entries. The institution listed is for the Center, which is not necessarily the institution for the investigator. This project is a family genetic study comparing childhood onset schizophrenia and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. The objective of this study is to identify genes associated with different facets of the schizophrenia phenotype. Our prior work corroborated earlier reports that childhood onset schizophrenia is a more familial form of schizophrenia than adult onset schizophrenia and helped to refine the characterization of the schizophrenia phenotype by comparing the sensitivity and specificity of three complimentary measures of the schizophrenia phenotype: 1) a diagnosis of schizophrenia; 2) presence of schizophrenic spectrum personality disorders defined by clinical interview or by questionnaire, and 3 neurocognitive impairments tapped by certain measures of attention/information processing. The neurocognitive measures were the most sensitive index of the schizophrenia phenotype while a diagnosis of schizophrenia was the most specific index of schizophrenia spectrum disorders . In addition, we have collected MRIs from 16 schizophrenic children and 24 normal control children using a high resolution SPGR image acquisition protocol. We have analyzed mesial temporal lobe volumes (amygdala and anterior and posterior hippocampus), total temporal lobe volume and total brain volume in order to replicate prior reports of significant reduction in mesial temporal structures in schizophrenic patients. We will begin to collect imaging data for siblings of child onset probands to examine the relationship between the volume of structures demonstrated in prior research to be either smaller or larger in schizophrenic patients than normal controls, and the presence of the three alternative measures of the schizophrenia phenotype cited above. In addition, we will attempt to identify genes associated with the presence of morphometric changes in the brains of schizophrenic probands and their siblings.