Singapore scientists unlock schizophrenia protein

[Celebration]

http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/singaporelocalnews/view/160049/1/.html

"It is basically like a short circuit. If a signal comes from the eyes and another comes from the hand, the two can 'crosstalk' and cause hallucinations, for example," said the Department of Anatomy's Dr Liang Fengyi.

These range from symptoms such as muscular weakness and loss of coordination, as in the case of multiple sclerosis, or illogical patterns of thinking and delusions, which characterise schizophrenia. Led by the head of the department Professor Ling Eng Ang and Dr Liang, the nine-member research team believes that its discovery is "fundamental and exciting".

The scientists have named the novel protein "juxtanodin" and feel it is fundamental to understanding the "myelin sheath" that shields the nerve fibres

[prodigal_green]

1. That is HUGE

Thanks for the post. I dated a guy once with schizophrenia (undiagnosed at the time), it is a dreadful disease.

[sam sarrha]

2. if there was a cure for schizophrenia in Biblical Times we wouldn't have

the problems we do now..

the only people who hear voices that say they are god and tell people to kill their children.. (like Abraham and his only son on the altar..)

are schitzophrenics..

Mohamed who was a dependent of Abraham and schizophrenia runs in families.. "Channeled" a spirit called Allah.

sounds to me like Religion in general is a side effect of Schizophrenia.

[Ian David]

23. Temporal and Frontal Lobe Epilepsy cause something similar

eMedicine - Temporal Lobe Epilepsy : Article by David Y Ko, MD
http://www.emedicine.com/NEURO/topic365.htm

eMedicine - Frontal Lobe Epilepsy : Article by Sheryl Haut, MD
http://www.emedicine.com/neuro/topic141.htm

[theHandpuppet]

3. Thanks for posting this!

Such a breakthrough is great news.

[mike_c]

4. here is a (long) explanation of the neuro-pathopsychology...

...underlying this, if anyone is interested. It's a fascinating read:

http://www.artificialingenuity.com/BB/viewtopic.php?p=230

An excerpt:

<snip...>
In their interaction with the neuronal system glial cells may have a boundary-setting function in the sense of information structuring. In other words: glial cells, especially astrocytes, divide the brain into spatially limited areas or compartments, on the one hand, and create functional units in various time scales with the neurons, on the other hand (Mitterauer, 1998, 2001a; Mitterauer and Kopp, 2003). Schizophrenia could be the phenomenological manifestation of the brain’s inability to constrain neuronal information processing among neuronal modules, since the glial system does not establish boundaries between them. This could be attributed to mutations in genes of glial cells. The glia will then lose their inhibitory or boundary-setting function. Thus, neuronal flux is unconstrained by normal glial boundaries, as is the flux of thought on the phenomenological level. Such a generalization of neuronal information processing could explain the main schizophrenic symptoms as delusions, hallucinations, thought disorder, catatonia and affective flattening (Mitterauer, 2001b, 2003, 2004).
For a better understanding of this hypothesis, let me next outline the basic temporal boundary-setting function of astrocytes in tripartite synapses. Since astrocytes express a wide variety of neurotransmitter receptors (and voltage-gated ion channels), they can be activated by cognate neurotransmitters. After activation the astrocyte itself produces neurotransmitter substances, by which it feedsback on the presynaptic element of the synapse (Auld and Robitaille, 2003). Here we deal with a temporarily turning off of neurotransmission in the sense of a negative feedback or glial boundary setting. For example, GABA, the major inhibitory neurotransmitter in the CNS, has recently been shown to be released by astrocytes in response to neuronal activity. Even the excitatory neurotransmitter glutamate can cause an excitatory or inhibitory postsynaptic membrane potential change, following release from astrocytic processes in the tripartite synapse (Bergles, 2002). Another function of astrocytes is the clearance from the synaptic cleft of neurotransmitters that have been released from neurons. This process is important in terminating the effects of released neurotransmitters, increasing the temporal resolution of information transfer, preventing excitotoxicity, and ensuring input specificity by limiting cross talk between synapses (Gallo and Chittajallu, 2001).
<snip...>

[BurtWorm]

8. It is fascinating

and difficult all at once. But is the general idea that schizophrenia and MS are etiologically similar? If they can figure out how to cure one they'll be able to figure out how to cure the other, and maybe other diseases caused by the presence of this protein?

[mike_c]

10. in essence, yes....

Myelin degeneration in motor nerves and astrocyte decline in the CNS disrupts outbound motor signaling in MS, and similar degeneration and astrocyte failure in other parts of the CNS can allow "cross-talk" between the information processing centers.

On the other hand, there is a HUGE accumulation of "evidence" that schizophrenia is really just garden variety demonic possession, so who can say where this will lead.... :evilgrin:

[Celebration]

12. LOL

Why didn't I notice this post earlier? Tell me the evidence!! I am huge into evidence based medicine. However I am open minded......

[ChairmanAgnostic]

5. Singapore saves people from pain and suffering, while Bush

practices faith based initiatives.

"Stem cells? Who needs bloody stem cells. God MADE them crazy (and probably librul, too) so screw the sick, the needy, the unfortunate and everyone else who is not born rich."

I applaud the successes in other nations. I am aghast at the lack of research here, due to restrictions, funding and faith-based politics.

[BurtWorm]

6. Am I reading this correctly? Schizophrenia and MS are related?

Schizophrenia is an auto-immune disease?

Wow!

[mike_c]

11. probably not directly, no....

I'm just guessing-- this is really new stuff, so no one can say where it will end up for sure. But my take is that saying s"chizophrenia and MS are related" because they share a common mechanism is like saying that HIV and allergies to cats are related because they both involve the immune system. Well, maybe that analogy is a bit stretched....

[Lexingtonian]

7. the article title seems pretty far ahead of the data

as far as I can tell. Journalists who sensationalize scientific stuff in this way are unfortunately something of a plague on good science.

But I'm happy for the YUS people getting to the cutting edge of things. It shouldn't be an American/European duopoly in biomedicine.

[beam me up scottie]

9. That was my take on it.

"Without this, we cannot talk about therapeutic intervention," said Prof Ling. So does the discovery spell hope for sufferers of neurological diseases?

"That is the million dollar question right now. The discovery has been critical in better understanding the structural components of the central nervous system and major disorders."

It's a small piece of a big puzzle but still important.

[Pepperbelly]

13. Sibgapore cheering the home team ... to be expected and ...

certainly nothing to get upset with.

And it is very exciting. An errant protein causing all that grief since forever.

[Celebration]

14. and to top it all off

a kind of western haiku, protein is key, therefore explore,

IN OTHER WORDS

go for it

[beam me up scottie]

15. Yeah, tell those diabetics

to skip their insulin and eat chocolate !
Go for it!

[Pepperbelly]

16. Did you put that in the wrong thread or something?

It makes no sense in the context of the conversation.

[beam me up scottie]

17. Sorry, the haiku comment got me all atwitter!

[Pepperbelly]

18. I tried to turn the post into a haiku for a bit but ...

grew bored counting syllables.

[beam me up scottie]

19. How many are you limited to?

[Pepperbelly]

20. 5,7,5 ...

Get's old.

[beam me up scottie]

21. LOL!

Yeah, it would!

[Pepperbelly]

22. as i slept on it ...

counting syllables,

one, then one, then another;

meaning is lost now.

[beam me up scottie]

24. Very good!

My artistic talents lie in another direction so I am unable to compete, unfortunately.
Is there a haiku group on DU ?

[Pepperbelly]

25. I don't know ...

but words are fun even apart from meanings, etc.

One of the things I do is music and I was literally liberated once when I heard an interview with Paul McCartney and during the course of the conversation, he claimed that he really didn't care much if lyrics made sense. He told of playing "Hey Jude" for John (Which is NOT about heroin so stop saying that!) right after he'd written it and got to the line, "The movement you need is on your shoulder", he stopped playing and told John that was just filler and he's write something that made more sense later. John said, "Don't change a thing! Best bloody line of the whole song."

It doesn't always have to make sense. Sometimes just the sounds of the words are sufficient. I had a little melody I'd written and took Paul's advice to heart. Coolest lyrics of any song I have written. And always remember, the working title for Yesterday was "Scrambled Eggs."

[Celebration]

26. I agree

Your haiku was excellent.

I had fun with this but not too difficult since you gave me the idea

The Beatles Lyrics

Lucy in the Sky Hey Jude

Yellow Submarine

It doesn't make much sense so you should like it. To get back to science, I found a cool study about people reading words when the word looked different from the meaning of the word. It is harder for people to see blue letters for instance, if the letters spell r-e-d, or y-e-l-l-o-w or something. I think it took people longer to process the color of the actual color of the letters in that case, than with some neutral word. Then, though, easily hypnotizable people were identified, and hypnotized to not process the word and just look at the color. They did much better than the non-hypnotized folks. I'm not sure of the practical value of all this, but it was an interesting study.

[Pepperbelly]

27. sorry ... i just went haiku loco for a little while ...

Smallest things undo

the largest creatures, brought low

by errant protein.

:D

Now THAT'S comedy.