Boris Chaumette is a psychiatrist in Marie-Odile Krebs' team at Sainte-Anne Hospital and a researcher at the 'Institut de Psychiatrie et Neurosciences de Paris'. He will talk about their cohort of patients at high risk of conversion to psychosis, and their work on related epigenetics and brain imaging biomarkers.

Epigenetic analyses of the emergence of psychosis during adolescence  

Schizophrenia is a progressive disease starting during adolescence in at-risk individuals. Less than a quarter of at-risk individuals will evolve toward a first episode of psychosis in three years through a process called conversion to psychosis. The reasons for this differential outcome remain largely unknown. We have explored the impact of genetic and environmental factors on the onset of the disease but it can be better explained by their interactions. Epigenetics could be the substrate of this G x E interplay. Previously, we reported longitudinal changes in DNA methylation and gene expression during the emergence of psychosis in at-risk individuals. In the same cohort, we recently explored the longitudinal changes of microRNAs expression during adolescence. If replicated, these results could contribute to a better understanding of the emergence of psychosis and may help to identify peripheral biomarkers or therapeutic targets, opening the way to a more personalized approach in psychiatry.

References

1. Influence of polygenic risk scores for schizophrenia and resilience on the cognition of individuals at-risk for psychosis. He et al, Transl Psychiatry  (2021) 11(1):518.
2. Missense variants in ATP1A3 and FXYD gene family are associated with childhood-onset schizophrenia. Chaumette et al, Mol Psychiatry (2020) 25(4):821-830.
3. Longitudinal Analyses of Blood Transcriptome During Conversion to Psychosis. Chaumette et al, Schizophr Bull (2019) 45(1):247-255.
4. Methylomic changes during conversion to psychosis. Kebir et al, Mol Psychiatry (2017) 22(4):512-518.