The DISC1 genetic pathway and its role in Schizophrenia development

Abstract

Schizophrenia is a severe mental disorder with a high heritability factor. Because of its early onset and high impact symptoms, it heavily affects the quality of life for the patient. Several mechanisms underlie the development of schizophrenia. Most of them involve cortical development. Here, some of the characteristic features of schizophrenia will be discussed. Next, one of the genes which is found to be related to schizophrenia, Disrupted In Schizophrenia 1 (DISC1), and its role in schizophrenia will be examined. However, the main focus will be on several other factors with which DISC1 interacts, and their possible role in schizophrenia. GSK3β, DIXDC1, NDEL1, LIS1, PCM1, BBS4, and APP all interact with DISC1 and are involved in cortical development. Of each factor, their function will be examined and how they might contribute to the development of schizophrenia. The conclusion drawn is that all these factors can play a role in the development of schizophrenia. Furthermore, defects in these targets might explain the broad diversity of DISC1 related defects which are related to schizophrenia. Therefore further research into these targets can be useful to get a better understanding of schizophrenia. Furthermore, the therapeutic value of this data will be discussed, which shows that usage of morpholino-oligonucleotides to specifically target DISC1 related defects might prove very successful