Altered expression of the CSMD1 gene in the peripheral blood of schizophrenia patients

Yansong Liu,Fuquan Zhang,Zhen Tang,Xiaoqian Fu,Chunming Zhu,Deyi Zhou,Yong Xu,Cui Li

doi:10.1186/s12888-019-2089-4

Abstract

BackgroundSchizophrenia (SCZ) is a heritable, refractory, and devastating psychiatric disorder. Previous studies have shown that the variants of CUB and sushi multiple domains 1 (CSMD1) demonstrate significant genome-wide association with SCZ. However, few studies have been conducted on the effect of antipsychotics on the expression levels of CSMD1. This study explored whether a change occurs in the expression of the CSMD1 gene before and after antipsychotic treatment in SCZ patients.MethodsThe study population comprised Han Chinese patients from eastern China, including 32 SCZ patients and 48 healthy controls. The expression of CSMD1 before and after treatment in the SCZ group and between the two groups was analyzed using real-time quantitative polymerase chain reaction (RT-qPCR).ResultsThe expression levels of the CSMD1 gene in the peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) of SCZ patients were lower than those in the healthy controls. The expression levels of the CSMD1 gene in the PBMCs of the SCZ patients after antipsychotic treatment were higher than those in the baseline SCZ patients (all P < 0.05).ConclusionsOur results showed that the expression levels of CSMD1 are correlated with the development and treatment of SCZ, providing further evidence for the involvement of CSMD1 in SCZ.

Highlights

Schizophrenia (SCZ) is a heritable, refractory, and devastating psychiatric disorder
The CUB and sushi multiple domains 1 (CSMD1) gene is a complement control-related protein located on 8p23.2, the variants of which were reported to have a strong correlation with SCZ risk in a recent study [3]
This study revealed that the expression level of the CSMD1 gene in peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) was up-regulated after antipsychotic treatment (Fig. 1 and Table 2)

Summary

Introduction

Schizophrenia (SCZ) is a heritable, refractory, and devastating psychiatric disorder. The CUB and sushi multiple domains 1 (CSMD1) gene is a complement control-related protein located on 8p23.2, the variants of which were reported to have a strong correlation with SCZ risk in a recent study [3]. The single-nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) rs10503253 inside the CSMD1 gene has been reported to be a major genome-wide risk locus for SCZ [4], and has been shown to be associated with multiple neurodevelopmental disorders [3, 5, 6]. CSMD1 has been reported as being involved in regulating the ratio between dopamine and serotonin metabolites in cerebrospinal fluid [12] These findings indicate that the CSMD1 gene is closely related to the neurogenesis, cognition, immunity, neuropsychology, and monoamine metabolism of SCZ. Recent studies on the relationship between CSMD1 and SCZ have been inconsistent; Liu et al BMC Psychiatry (2019) 19:113 studies have found no association between rs10503253 and SCZ in patients of Japanese [13] and Han Chinese descent [14]

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Discussion

Conclusion