A Neurobiological Study on Heterogeneity of Schizophrenia: Genetic Variations and Neurobiological Differentiations

The project will use the early stage and drug naïve schizophrenic patients as the study subjects. The specific aims are: 1. To test the hypothesis that the patient group with good antipsychotic treatment response mainly carries the risk polymorphism of DRD2 and COMT genes (the dopamine transmission genes) while the group with poor antipsychotic treatment response mainly carries the risk polymorphism of DISC1 and NRG1 genes (the neurodevelopmental genes). This association is controlled by the polymorphism of genes of drug metabolizing enzymes. 2. The good vs. poor treatment response group will have different manifestation patterns in biomarkers directly or indirectly related to neurodevelopmental or dopamine neurotransmission genes. These potential biomarkers included biochemical parameters, electrophysiological and neurocognitive indicators. 3. The good vs. poor responder group has differential changes of the response-related biomarkers comparing pre-treatment and post-treatment status in special sub-sample of the drug-naïve early schizophrenia patients.