Archive alert. For those that have not been bitten by the Twitter bug (or the friend feed bug, for that matter. After all, FF can be used to follow those on Twitter w/o having to actually sign up at Twitter. FYI). Below are my musings from the Keystone Conference on the Molecular basis of Schizophrenia, with a few updates from the parallel meeting “Epigenetic Basis of Neurodevelopmental Disorders”.

Feel free to contact me to expand upon any of the points listed below. As I said previously, my next meeting report will come from Limerick Ireland, at the Wiring the Brain conference. (cont.)

noahwilliamgray: T. Insel (NIMH)- (Un)officially confirms that Obama will repeal stem cell research bans at 11 AM on Monday. #molschiz09
9 days ago from TwitterFon · Reply · View Tweet

noahwilliamgray: T. Insel (NIMH)- Healthcare economic burden of schiz/bipolar went from $156B to 317.6B b/t 1992 & 2002 in US. Yikes!! #molschiz09
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noahwilliamgray: T.Insel (NIMH)- “Don’t use psychiatric genetics in diagnosis, rather for therapeutic target identification.” http://is.gd/mdEv (expand) #molschiz09
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noahwilliamgray: NIMH strategic plan for $368M = “pathophys; chart disease trajectories; develop interventions; strengthen public health impact.” #molschiz09
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noahwilliamgray: F. Gage (Salk)- Building upon http://is.gd/mdVd (expand); L1 retro events found in human cells. Highly active in NSCs only. We are mosaics. #epidev09
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noahwilliamgray: S. Purcell (MGH)- Highly polygenic model of #molschiz09 w/ 1000’s of very small SNP associations aggregating. Consortium: http://is.gd/mh3O (expand)
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noahwilliamgray: P. Sklar (Harvard)- Ion channel mutations significant in bipolar GWAS: (http://is.gd/mhgK (expand)) 2 genes expected by chance, got 14. #molschiz09
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noahwilliamgray: Pharmacogenetic studies now designed to link gene associations w/ drug response, e.g., to lithium, to better predict response. #molschiz09
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noahwilliamgray: I know genome screens lead to targeted functional studies, but perusing assoc data w/o function always leaves me dissatisfied. #molschiz09
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noahwilliamgray: P. Jones (Cambridge)- Significant potential for gene-environment interaction for schiz but not bipolar. http://is.gd/mkwF (expand) #molschiz09
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noahwilliamgray: P. Jones (cont.)- Cold Harbour in SE London has highest incidence of schiz found in the AESOP study. What’s up with that ward?? #molschiz09
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noahwilliamgray: D.Ma (Hopkins)- Gadd45-mediated demethylation (e.g. BDNF promoter) enhances activity-induced adult neurogenesis. http://is.gd/mhSu (expand) #epidev09
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noahwilliamgray: David Porteous (U. Edinburgh)- DISC1 (http://is.gd/mojh (expand)) involved in many neural functions; developent, memory, plasticity… #molschiz09
8 days ago from web · Reply · View Tweet

noahwilliamgray: H. Song (Hopkins)- Deriving iPSCs (http://is.gd/mpPp (expand)) from patient fibroblasts to establish schizophrenia models. #molschiz09
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noahwilliamgray: L-H Tsai (MIT)- DISC1 negatively regulates GSK3β, causing a rise in βcatenin levels, increasing neural progenitor proliferation. #molschiz09
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noahwilliamgray: Tsai (cont.)- GSK3β inhibitors ameliorate behavioral deficiencies caused by reduced DISC1 expression in a loose model of scz. #molschiz09
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noahwilliamgray: Tsai (cont.)- Study in Press @ Cell. Interesting discussion suggested DISC1 acts as endogenous Li+, b/c of similar biol effects. #molschiz09
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noahwilliamgray: I’ll be in the sessions at this meeting today- http://is.gd/mx3i (expand) Updates forthcoming. #molschiz09
7 days ago from web · Reply · View Tweet

noahwilliamgray: F. Gage (Salk)- Extension of this: http://is.gd/mxai (expand). Now finds that enhanced retrotransposition could underlie Rett syndrome. #molschiz09
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noahwilliamgray: B. Lahn (U. Chicago)- Neural gene evolution much faster in primates than rodents; especially amongst brain size regulators. #molschiz09
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noahwilliamgray: Great interview with Bruce Lahn on brain evolution from SEED- http://is.gd/mxiC (expand) #molschiz09
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noahwilliamgray: J.Kelsoe (UCSD)- For bipolar, “Meds response closely linked to disease mechanism; these clinical data may help bench research.” #molschiz09
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noahwilliamgray: E.Scolnick @ Broad offering lots of $ & expertise for any academic scientist to develop ideas w/ the support akin to industry. #molschiz09
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noahwilliamgray: D.Porteous(U.Edinburgh)-“FDA is wrong; approval rules should be thrown out when treating a specific small group”(scz:~50K peeps) #molschiz09
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