Schizophrenia - future Research (Genes)

Professor David Porteous reflects upon the achievement of finding candidate genes for schizophrenia and has high hopes for the future.

Well I think what lies in store for the future is very positive. I think that we can say that because there are a number of really well confirmed findings in the field. What we are starting to see is a transition from groping in the dark, knowing there's some gold there, to having nuggets that we need now to work on. And there's much work that needs to be done. What we need to do is to work out exactly what these genes that appear to be significant risk factors do, how they affect the development of the brain, the function of the brain and the function of the individual with the outside world. It is likely that different genes will play different parts in that overall process. Some to do with early development effects, some to do with the way that different individuals handle extrasensory information and processing. There will be a variety of different contributions towards the total risk of schizophrenia. But I think perhaps the greatest hope is that we will go from a condition where we rely absolutely on signs and symptoms from clinical diagnosis towards a time when we can have a more clear-cut biological marker of the condition, as we have for example with blood cholesterol and risk of heart disease. And that's something which we really desperately need in this field to make it more objective and less subjective.