The neuregulin 1 (NRG1) receptor, ErbB4, has been identified as a potential risk gene for schizophrenia. HER4/ErbB4 is a receptor tyrosine kinase whose transcript undergoes alternative splicing in the brain. Exon 16 encodes isoforms containing a metalloprotease cleavable extracellular domain (JM-a), exon 15 for a cleavage resistant form (JM-b) and exon 26 for a cytoplasmic domain (CYT-1) with a...

Indirect evidence for disturbed structural connectivity of subcortical fiber tracts in schizophrenia has been obtained from functional neuroimaging and electrophysiologic studies. During the past few years, new structural imaging methods have become available. Diffusion tensor imaging and magnetization transfer imaging (MTI) have been used to investigate directly whether fiber tract abnormaliti...

S chizophrenia is a devastating brain disease that affects ∼1% of the population worldwide and is characterized by a complex array of positive (delusions and hallucinations), negative (apathy and social withdrawal), and cognitive (deficits in attention and working memory) symptoms. Clinical features of schizophrenia frequently arise during late adolescence or early adulthood, which places this ...

Neuregulin 1 (NRG1) and ErbB4, critical neurodevelopmental genes, are implicated in schizophrenia, but the mediating mechanisms are unknown. Here we identify a genetically regulated, pharmacologically targetable, risk pathway associated with schizophrenia and with ErbB4 genetic variation involving increased expression of a PI3K-linked ErbB4 receptor (CYT-1) and the phosphoinositide 3-kinase sub...

Objective: Although the etiology of schizophrenia is unknown, it has a significant genetic component. ‎A number of studies have indicated that neuregulin-1 (NRG1) gene may play a role in the ‎pathogenesis of schizophrenia. In this study, we examined whether the rs2439272 of NRG1 ‎is associated with schizophrenia and its negative symptoms in an Iranian population.‎ Method: Rs2439272 was genotype...

Heavy cannabis abuse increases the risk of developing schizophrenia. Adolescents appear particularly vulnerable to the development of psychosis-like symptoms after cannabis use. To test whether the schizophrenia candidate gene neuregulin 1 (NRG1) modulates the effects of cannabinoids in adolescence, we tested male adolescent heterozygous transmembrane domain Nrg1 mutant (Nrg1 TM HET) mice and w...

Neuregulin-1 (NRG1) variations have been shown to modulate schizophrenia candidate endophenotypes related to brain structure and function. The aim of this study was to determine the effect of NRG1 on several oculomotor schizophrenia endophenotypes. The effects of 5 core single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) within the NRG1 gene to oculomotor parameters in a battery of oculomotor tasks (saccade...

Neuregulin-1 (NRG1) signaling participates in numerous neurodevelopmental processes. Through linkage analysis, nrg1 has been associated with schizophrenia, although its pathophysiological role is not understood. The prevailing models of schizophrenia invoke hypofunction of the glutamatergic synapse and defects in early development of hippocampal-cortical circuitry. Here, we show that the erbB4 ...

BACKGROUND Substantial evidence from human post-mortem and genetic studies has linked the neurotrophic factor neuregulin 1 (NRG1) to the pathophysiology of schizophrenia. Genetic animal models and in vitro experiments have suggested that altered NRG1 signaling, rather than protein changes, contributes to the symptomatology of schizophrenia. However, little is known about the effect of NRG1 on s...

CONTEXT NRG1 is a schizophrenia candidate gene and plays an important role in brain development and neural function. Schizophrenia is a complex disorder, with etiology likely due to epistasis. OBJECTIVE To examine epistasis between NRG1 and selected N-methyl-d-aspartate-glutamate pathway partners implicated in its effects, including ERBB4, AKT1, DLG4, NOS1, and NOS1AP. DESIGN Schizophrenia ...