Gene Associated with Schizophrenia Linked to Intelligence
Is your intelligence partly influenced by the same gene that influences susceptibility to schizophrenia? Apparently so, say researchers in the US, because the gene for dysbindin-1, previously implicated in schizophrenia, appears also to influence general human intelligence.
Researchers led by Katherine E. Burdick at the Zucker Hillside Hospital in New York report in the 15 May issue of Human Molecular Genetics that a region on chromosome 6p, previously associated with schizophrenia, may be linked to variation in intelligence.
(For a quick introduction to previous work identifying DTNB1, which encodes dysbindin-1, as a susceptibility gene for schizophrenia, see the commentary ‘Dysbindin-1 and schizophrenia: from genetics to neuropathology’ in the Journal of Clinical Investigation. The full text of the article featured in that commentary is available from PubMed. You can also use PubMed to find a slew of related articles.)
Burdick’s team reports an association between the DTNBP1 genotype and general cognitive ability in two independent cohorts, including 213 individuals with schizophrenia or schizo-affective disorder and 126 volunteers free of schizophrenic symptoms. The researchers conclude that their data suggest that DTNBP1 genetic variation also influences human intelligence.
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