The biology of madness is being explored. It seems to be about neural networks and neural development. This is another paper that adds to that dataset. Linked as is open access.
In our analysis of conserved miRNAs, the targetome of miR-9-5p showed the strongest association with schizophrenia (Table). Based on these results, we attempted to evaluate its role in schizophrenia. … Among those are 21 genes residing in regions with a genome-wide–significant signal in the PGC2 GWAS.12 Functional annotation of the miR-9-5p gene set using DAVID showed enrichment in regulatory function, brain development, and various transcription factors, with FOXO3 having the highest fold enrichment (eTable 12, eTable 13, and eTable 14 in the Supplement). In our analyses of spatiotemporal expression patterns, miR-9-5p showed a distinct peak in expression around the 16th postconception week across all brain regions.
The genes are not related to the pharmacology: the pharmacology seems to work via second messengers that stimulate neural repair. This is of intellectual interest, but makes, unfortunately, at present not a whit of difference to the mad or to the treatment options we have.
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