Progress in neuro-psychopharmacology & biological psychiatry
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Prog. Neuropsychopharmacol. Biol. Psychiatry · Aug 2014
A preliminary study of functional connectivity of medication naïve children with obsessive-compulsive disorder.
Evidence suggests that obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) is associated with a dysfunction in the cortico-striatal-thalamic-cortical (CSTC) circuitry. Resting state functional connectivity magnetic resonance imaging (rs-fcMRI) allows measurements of resting state networks (RSNs), brain networks that are present at 'rest'. However, although OCD has a typical onset during childhood or adolescence, only two other studies have performed rs-fcMRI comparisons of RSNs in children and adolescents with OCD against healthy controls. ⋯ Our preliminary findings of case-control differences in RSNs lend further support to the CSTC hypothesis of OCD, as well as implicating other regions of the brain outside of the CSTC.
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Prog. Neuropsychopharmacol. Biol. Psychiatry · Aug 2014
Elevated postmortem striatal t-DARPP expression in schizophrenia and associations with DRD2/ANKK1 polymorphism.
Dopamine- and cAMP-regulated phosphoprotein of molecular weight 32 kDa (DARPP-32) and calcineurin (CaN) have been implicated in the pathogenesis of schizophrenia because they function as molecular integrators of dopamine and glutamate signaling. DARPP-32 and CaN are mainly expressed in the caudate nucleus and putamen; however, a few postmortem brain studies have focused on DARPP-32 expression in striatum from patients with schizophrenia. ⋯ These results may reflect potential molecular mechanisms important to the pathogenesis of schizophrenia.