Citation

Turecki G, Sequeira A, Klempan T, Canetti L, Gingras Y. Psychiatr. Danub. 2006; 18(Suppl 1): 101.

Affiliation

Douglas Hospital Research Center, Pavillion Frank B Common, 6875 Lasalle Blvd, H4H 1R3 Montreal, Canada. gustavo.turecki@mcgill.ca.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2006, Facultas Universitatis Studiorum Zagrabiensis - Danube Symposion of Psychiatry)

DOI

unavailable

PMID

16964040

Abstract

Several molecular alterations have been observed in different areas of the suicide brain, but no clear picture has yet emerged about global alteration patterns. We have conducted a gene expression study on total mRNA isolated from 17 cortical (Brodman areas (BA) 4, 6, 8-9, 10, 11, 20, 21, 38, 44, 45, 46, 47 and subcortical (BA24, BA29, amygdala, hippocampus, nucleus accumbens) post-mortem brain areas. We processed and analyzed expression data from a total of 38 suicide cases (16 with and 10 without major depression) and 12 matched controls using the Affymetrix HG-U133 chip set containing around 44000 probesets. Outlier detection was performed using 5'/3' ratios, principal component analysis and hierarchical clustering. We observed the highest number of suicide specific alterations in prefrontal cortical areas in agreement with previous observations implicating this region in suicide. Gene ontology analysis of differentially expressed genes revealed an overrepresentation of genes implicated in regulation of transcription and nucleotide metabolism and binding associated with suicide. In subcortical areas, in particular in hippocampus, we observed mainly depression specific alterations and an overrepresentation of genes implicated in second messenger systems and neurotransmission. This study suggests specific molecular alterations in discrete regions of the brain.

Language: en