Stats and Reflection

Our BOINC GPU grid computed 131 units for the Barcelona Biomedical Research Park - Molecular Simulation of Proteins.  This means that through the duration of this project, our computer looked at 131 units of proteins using its computational power.  19,111 tasks are currently in progress on this grid, and we have contributed to one of them.  This company currently has 45,000 computers computing for this research.  It really shows how much power is needed to do these simulations for their research.  We find this incredible because we feel like we helped make a difference without really doing direct work.  It's crazy how technology is advanced enough that we were able to contribute to research.  It's amazing how anyone in the world with an electronic device with computational power can help contribute to any research that they are interested in by simply downloading a program.  This project really helped bridge the gap between the concepts we were learning in class to real world research and issues.  We were able to make new connections between a commonly known disease to evolutionary ideas we learned.  We would have never taken this approach in looking at Schizophrenia.  If it weren't for this project, we wouldn't know about the power of grid mapping and using blogs.

Schizophrenia Q&A

Questions – Schizophrenia

These questions address the Schizophrenia Bulletin article entitled “Schizophrenia, Psychiatric Genetics, and Darwinian Psychiatry: An Evolutionary Framework” by Peralson and Folley, 2008.

1. Is schizophrenia a qualitative or quantitative trait?  What is the estimated heritability of this phenotype?

This is most likely a multi-gene trait with common alleles that are risks to causing this disease.  By themselves, those genes would not cause the disease, but when they all come together the disease is manifested (polygenic disease).  All genes are needed for the disorder to be present.  This makes it a quantitative trait.  No specific genes are linked to Schizophrenia, but a number of genes contribute to causing the disorder.  They increase the probability of the disease manifesting in a person. 

            In concordance studies with twins, in identical twins, they are forty to sixty percent likely to get the disease, as opposed to fraternal twins that are ten to twenty percent likely to get the disease.  This indicates that genetics has a lot to do with the cause of the disease, but environment still plays a point (“The Heritability of Schizophrenia”).  Disequilibrium studies have also been performed.  In these studies, large families affected by the disease are studied and their chromosomes are compared to families who are not affected.  From these studies, it has been shown that no specific chromosomal locations have been found that specifically cause the disease.  A variety of loci contribute to causing the disease.  When assessing families with Schizophrenia, the family genes are combined for assessment because of the smaller family size.  This can cause issues to identifying specific genes that cause the disorder because some families may have different genes specifically causing the disease than another family (“Schizophrenia and Genetics”). 

2.  
1. What kind of inheritance explains the observed patterns seen in schizophrenia?

It is the unfavorable combination of specific genes that contribute to neuron and brain development.  These changes in the genes are due to copy number variance and single nucleotide polymorphisms within the normal range (refer back to question 1 for more specifics).  

2. Why do schizophrenia risk genes persist in evolution?

The genes themselves are not selected against when inherited singly.  They are “below the radar” of selection.  Some inherited individually have a compensatory advantage or are neutral, keeping them in the population.  These genes are only selected against when the right combination is inherited and the disease occurs. 

3. What are the possible heterozygote advantages associated with schizophrenia?  Do you agree?

These alleles alone can be associated with normal or increased fertility, making them advantageous.  Another advantage associated with Schizophrenia for the genes would be in an ancestral environment.  An example of how these genes came to be would be through “broken genes”.  For example, some genes provided protective advantage with salt retention when salt was not readily available in the environment.  Overtime, keeping this trait when sodium is now plentiful contributes to the elevated levels of hypertension seen in society today.  There is a similar idea with diabetes.  In the ancestral environment, these genes expressed hormones that caused insulin resistance that helped with more effective fat storage, helping with limited availability of food.  Now this trait is disadvantageous and causes elevated levels of obesity in people with this disease because of unnecessary fat storage.  These genes are associated with causing diabetes.  There might have been adaptations that Schizophrenia susceptibility genes caused, but they have yet to be identified.  Schizophrenia might have been advantageous in causing paranoia in ancestral environments, helping protect the person from predators or other possible dangers.  We agree with these ideas the paper presents.  As the environment changed over time, the advantages the genes offered also changed.  Because of modern medicine, these traits will be retained in the population, as these issues most likely can be treated.  Also, carriers will continue to contribute these traits to the next generation.

 

3. If heterosis is acting on the schizophrenia alleles, what might you expect will happen to these alleles over the long term ? (Think fitness tables...)

If heterosis is acting on the schizophrenia alleles, you would expect that over a long period of time the heterozygote genotype will become fixed in the population with the homozygote dominate and homozygote recessive genotypes going to an equilibrium based on the frequency they are at during the time heterosis is selected for.  This means that the schizophrenia alleles will always be in the population.  There will always be a small population of people who are affected by schizophrenia because currently only one percent of people are affected. 

4. This paper, and much of evolutionary psychology, is panselectionist or ultradarwinist.  What does that mean?  What other mechanisms of evolution might be at play here?

A panselectionism is the belief that the only mechanism of evolution was natural selection and that all genes are inherited (“Neo-Darwinism”).  An ultra-darwinist is a person who believes in Darwin’s idea of natural selection, but thinks that it is the only mechanism of evolution (Cain 220).  This paper emphasizes these ideas greatly, putting great consideration on natural selection in the evolution of the schizophrenia genes.  The paper briefly mentions that sexual selection may have caused schizophrenia to appear in the population.  Exaptation is also mentioned, as some of these genes may have started being used for other functions like speech and art.  Other mechanisms of evolution that should be considered when analyzing these traits should be mutations, genetic drift, and gene flow.  There might have been disadvantageous mutations that caused these alleles to become present in the population.  Founder affect might have occurred, bringing together a population with these alleles that would increase the frequency of inheriting schizophrenia susceptibility genes.  Gene flow might have then integrated these alleles into larger populations over time. 

If you want to read more, check out this link:  http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2632450/

Works Cited

Cain, Clifford Chalmers. "Darwin's Pious Idea: Why The Ultra-Darwinists And Creationists Both Get It Wrong - By Conor Cunningham." Reviews In Religion & Theology 19.2 (2012): 220-221. Academic Search Complete. Web. 2 Apr. 2014.

"The Heritability of Schizophrenia." Biological Basis of Mental Health. Open Educational Resources, n.d. Web. 2 Apr. 2014.

"Neo-Darwinism." Princeton University. N.p., n.d. Web. 02 Apr. 2014. <http://www.princeton.edu/~achaney/tmve/wiki100k/docs/Neo-Darwinism.html>.

"Schizophrenia and Genetics: Research Update | Psych Central." Psych Central.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 02 Apr. 2014. <http://psychcentral.com/lib/schizophrenia-and-genetics-research-update/0008736>.

Specialist Interview

Specialist Interview
Started at 4:00 PM 2/12/14

For our interview, we chose to talk to Dr. Saz Madison from the Psychology Department at Rockhurst University.  Here are the notes from the interview:

1.       What is your attitude on dealing with patients affected by schizophrenia?  Do you enjoy working with them?

Saz:  I have.  Very much… Any population I work with, I consider the situation a person that is dealing with (x) whatever the psychological dysfunction.  This is an individual. I do what I can to understand and predict and intervene in regards to their lifestyle.  When I see a schizophrenic, mostly I experience determination and excitement.  I enjoy working with populations who experience significant psychological disabilities.  People think of it as a diagnosis.  It’s really more accurate to recognize that schizophrenia as a constellation of disorders.  Many different subtypes constitute to a set of disorders.  It’s hard to say how I like working with it.

Sarah:  cuz it varies so much

Saz:  right.  For example catatonic – muscular not as active

Paranoid schizophrenics are more active because they experience hallucinations. It might be exhausting dealing with emotionally effusive schizophrenics with a flattening affect because there are intense types of interactions.

2.       As a psychologist, how are schizophrenics’ brains different from a normal person’s brain?

·         There is less grey matter in a schizophrenic’s brain.  Fluid filled area (think central ventricles) they are larger in a person with schizophrenia evidence of tissue atrophy/loss.  In terms of overall brain tissue there tends to be less. 

·         Increased activity in dopamine pathogens and might be responsible for positive symptoms of schizophrenia.  We don’t know if we get these changes in neuro-anatomy or neurophysiology as a result of the onset of the disorder or if these changes are from development of disorder. 

·         Consistently evidence of tissue loss or atrophy from the onset of this disorder.  We don’t have a lot of very definitive evidence for this.  There is evidence for decreased activity in the limbic system changes in function of the hypothalamus, not any particular structures, some changes in function of the thalamus (which makes sense if thought responsible for interpreting info about senses and then we have hallucinations that are sensory in nature). 

·         When some schizophrenics have speech problems then they may have differences in their Brocca’s and Wernicke’s, the primary language areas of brain.  If we don’t use parts of our brains then different areas of the brain encroach on that area of brain. 

·         Don’t know if changes are from thought disorder/language disorder resulting in neurological changes.  Neurological anomalies result in the development of the disorder. 

3.       What challenges are associated with treating patients affected by schizophrenia?

·         Saz:  answer on two levels.  Challenges overall and challenges with specific patients

·         Typically poor treatments for some aspects of schizophrenia.  Positive symptoms of schizophrenia have pharmacological treatments, whereas negative symptoms are difficult to treat.  Positive symptoms are things you get during onset, negative are things you lose, like emotional mobility. 

o   Example of student:  so excited to see student haven’t seen in a while then realize they’re going to prison oh no!

o   Males are more likely to experience negative symptoms

·         Professionals are not good at treating emotional issues.  Much better treatments for, getting a little better at treating emotional reciprocity…

·         positive treatments have great treatments (drug treatments) antipsychotics.  Do a good job with positive symptoms.  Hallucinations and delusions.  Good at doing that

·         Challenges in general are trying to figure out ways to intervene with negative symptoms in schizophrenia. 

o   Specific patient:  youngest schizophrenic/person he felt was appropriately diagnosed was 17 years old and one of his negative symptoms was he had severe atonality (like when we talk our tone changes, might go to something different, helps communicate with things). 

o   Had serious affecting flattening – tonal completely delayed experienced emotions when talking (monotone).  Once lived in an inpatient facility and we were taking them and some of the other residents on a day trip a canoe trip.  He was afraid of water.  So on the trip, he’s in a canoe with me and we’re going and he’s just sort of sitting there and I said you seem very very quiet and he goes (shakes head) and that’s it and well that’s ok and we keep talking and these are the things we’re going to try. 

o   The river had many turns and a branch touched his face and he says oh no oh no oh no and he flips the canoe and ends up in the water and he’s just so afraid and he’s terrified and says can’t swim can’t swim and while I’m getting my arm around him he couldn’t communicate to me the fear he was experiencing. 

o   Normally, when he got angry his voice would get a little louder. 

o   Couldn’t scream when he fell in water just loudly spoke. 

o   Got to the side of the river and on shore and he’s expressing the same emotions tonally except tears are going down his face.  How could I have anticipated that this would have happened in this experience?  Earlier when I was enthusing about the canoe trip, was he trying to communicate to me what he felt?  It’s challenging in regards to how do I get to the point where I’m good at anticipating that this individual will respond (how they will respond and what’s the best way to respond to them)

4.       There are several subtypes of schizophrenia.  Is there a subtype that you’ve experienced more than others?

·         Paranoid schizophrenia – it’s so significantly more common than the others that probably unless someone is specialized in a particular type it’ll be paranoid with positive symptoms

·         hallucinations and/or delusions (more frequently)

o   Hallucinations are still very very frequent in paranoid schizophrenia.  In terms of symptom prevalence paranoid with delusions of persecution.  ßanecdotal – probably the most common delusions found in people with paranoid schizophrenia.  Any delusions, false belief that there are forces outside of myself that are allied against me in some way. 

o   Example:  It may be in the form of I’m a university professor and I feel like my students are working against me so I won’t get hired and that one student is a super hero who is using her power to influence others to get students to get at me and I know this because I have had encounters with aliens before.  If I don’t engage in some behavior designed to protect me from then then I’ll be vulnerable. 

·         Sarah:  How do you deal with those interactions (without laughing)?

·         We laugh but the fact of the matter is any time we go into any field before we get into it and learn about it (especially post-grad education), we often think that we know how we will respond in certain situations.  We mature in knowledge, understanding, and professionally.  I was absolutely sure when I went to Rockhurst that I wanted to be a child psychologist.  Ended up that I didn’t have the emotional maturity to deal with it.  Swore would never do it again.  In undergrad I was not aware enough of what I would want and experience.  When experienced in grad school, I was not emotionally or intellectually prepared for the encounters in childhood psychology.  Now I can work with any population and I can respond to it. 

o   Purpose of rotations in grad school – really all part of professional development (literally us developing into a professional). 

1.       What are some of the most common misconceptions about the disease?

o   First one thinks of bothers him a lot.  People see them as dangerous/threatening.  A good way to characterize it is you picture the person standing on street corner talking to themself.  Oh hey there’s that crazy person.  Parent with children pull kids closer.  In actuality them engaging in negative acts is very unlikely, even more unlikely compared to normal people. 

o   We presume that because they suffer from psychological dysfunction that they are dangerous.  Significant mistreatment of them.  Leads to isolation.  We could avoid this.  They could have a better quality of life. 

o   Major misconception:  relates to what we talked about.  Schizophrenia means one thing that it’s one disorder which we can list criteria for.  However, it is a constellation of disorders.  Believe it could better be thought of as a schizophrenia spectrum disorder.  Much like autism spectrum disorder considered now.  The way it manifests itself in regards to the different types, they are all so fairly distinct but also functionally different.  We can anticipate different symptoms, levels of functioning, ability to engage in activities of daily living (for example) depending on the type. 

2.       Are there are any alternative treatments for the treatment of this disease?  Do you think they’re effective?

o   For positive symptoms I said psychopharmacology for positive symptoms best treatments

o   Talk therapies have yet to show empirical data

o   Cognitive therapies remediate some of the negative symptoms

o   Ex:  we talked about lack of social reciprocities:  behavioral social skills training interventions actually train the person with the disease who is experiencing symptoms

o   They can be taught to respond appropriately by helping them recognize social behaviors ex:  how to respond during a funeral or when to laugh and when not to

o   interventions are designed to increase my ability to engage in daily activities and get out and maintain employment, healthy relationships, romantic interpersonal relationships.  Behavioral interventions (most empirical support)

MISCONCEPTION:  can I say one thing about a misconception

o   A major misconception is that people think it’s a split personality.  That’s a completely different disorder (dissociative identity disorder).  Because it is schizophrenia and that it translates as “split mind”, they think that it means split personality.  Example:  Jim Carry movie – me, myself, and Irene – media feeding misconception

Have you ever heard about Jeni?  How do you feel about her?

o   Childhood diagnosis of major psychological disorders is bad.  Earlier this year, not me being/distracting, the APA released latest DSM5:  where we define what schizophrenia is.  One of the trends in DSM5 does a greater deal with childhood manifestations

o   The average age of onset for schizophrenia positive symptoms is young adulthood – very late teens into twenties this is when it typically manifests itself. 

o   Anything pre-pubescent aka any time diagnosis is made pre-puberty, I tend to be skeptical about those diagnoses.  There might be a better explanation for the behaviors being seen.  I am very behavioral oriented.  I believe that behavioral theory could go a long way in explaining the presence of many of these behaviors that are associated with schizophrenia in children. 

o   Example:  Have an obsession with set of items and engage in obsessive relationship with them (ex:  believe media is talking to them).  Behavioral theory suggests that those behaviors are shaped by the reinforcement in their environment and maintained by the presence of their environment. 

o   Example:  If you give attention for a behavior – child is being reinforced for performing behaviors (parents or teachers expect them to act that way, provide reinforcement for when they do behavior).

o   Example:  child who throws temper tantrum – parents – fix kid.  My first thought is why are you paying them to throw temper tantrums.  How do you respond when they do it?  You respond the way they want (too busy to pay attention). 

o   Example:  Friend is over, child throws temper tantrum for sweets, you’re embarrassed so you give them a cookie.  Child got what he/she wants, which increases likelihood of behavior

o   Behavioral theory can explain some adult schizophrenics.  Look at other possibilities before you think it is actual childhood onset.  Is it possible?  Yes, literature says that it is.  Have I ever seen a child be diagnosed with it?  No.  Youngest experience = seventeen year old with schizophrenia – agreed with diagnosis, a little skeptic at first but eventually agreed

o   Should look for alternative ideas for treatment

o   Our field (parent fields:  philosophy and biology) this sort of biological model, medical model that a lot of clinicians employed really leads us to look for a diagnosis which often leads us to missing the individual.  Might miss things that are specific to the individual.  Might be environmental conditions from parents behaviors – symptoms may be from psychosocial or environmental

o   Monica:  parents just want a label, don’t really care what’s going on just want to label kid

o   Saz:  look at it from parent or sibling, boy doesn’t it feel so much more comfortable to know what it is.  For professionals, to understand and intervene, we don’t have that luxury or at least it’s not appropriate for us.  It’s lazy and unethical.  I think it’s important that we look at the individual that is experiencing these things and respond to that individual.  If you get a diagnosis, that’s great for communication and treatment planning, but the important thing is the individual and they are idiosyncratic.  Sadly, we use this sort of population/data driven approach to make a decision about an individual sitting in front of us.  Want to respond to that individual first… sometimes there’s an over reliance on diagnosis

o   Think of it as people experiencing these life challenges – may be better to describe by explaining with this disorder or this disorder.  We are trying to understand human beings (don’t rely on label)

o   Danger to paying more attention to a diagnosis overall as opposed to the individual.  When looking at a diagnosis and no longer the person, you may miss something

o   Respond on level of individual not the level of the diagnosis.  Look at the whole picture not just one little side.

1.       What kind of perspective should people take?

o   Saz:  the way he approaches them, working with them, they are people who are suffering from psychological distress problems in life.  The way that we approach interacting with them initially family member, clinician is as that they are another human being.  They have had experiences that we cannot understand.  These people who are experiencing these difficulties that we cannot understand may be experiencing life differently because of misconceptions due to their disease.  They are treated poorly and they almost anticipate being treated dismissively or badly.  It’s a really unfortunate thing.

o   Approach them:  I like this part of the question.  Need to remember that schizophrenics recognize that they see the world differently and inaccurately.  It’s not consistent with the reality that everyone else experiences.  Now imagine coming to understand that the way you understand the world is not like anybody else.  All of these things I believe are wrong.  Someone who has visual or auditory hallucinations:  I have this friend I see all the time… what?  what do you mean they do not exist.  This is the reason depression is so frequent with diagnosis of schizophrenia. 

o   We should approach them with compassion and try to be as understanding as possible.  We have to approach them with humility.  If we go into interactions and expect what they’ll be like, we go in with assumptions that will mislead us with the interaction.

Interview ended at 5:04 PM 2/12/2014

Reflection:

1.       It was very insightful.  I learned things I had never thought of before.  Dr. Madison told many good stories.  We really enjoyed his quote that we are trying to understand human beings not focusing just on diagnosis.  I learned how schizophrenics saw the world and how diverse the disease is.  When we asked him about misconceptions, he opened our eyes to many different aspects of this disease. 

2.       From the interview, we had a change of insight.  We feel more caring and compassionate toward schizophrenics.  We feel less afraid of approaching people with this disease.  Dr. Madison told us to approach schizophrenics with compassion and humility. 

3.       The only thing that disturbed us from the interview was his example of his patient that could not express his emotion.  We felt that it would be frustrating as the therapist to have to find ways to understand and help with that.  We were also disturbed by the one size fits all diagnosis that is given by many psychologists that help people with psychological disorders. 

4.       The connections we had between the interview and the classwork we have been doing was how he mentioned that schizophrenia can be highly hereditary.  Also, we had asked him about how schizophrenia affected brain function in an attempt to compare what he said to what we had researched in our first blog post.  Dr. Madison also seemed very surprised and interested in us contributing to grid-computing for our evolution class.  

Introduction to the Project

What Is Schizophrenia?

Schizophrenia can be defined as a severe brain disorder in which its victims abnormally interpret reality. People with schizophrenia show symptoms of hallucinations, delusions, thought disorders represented by uncommon thought processes, and movement disorders where patients express frantic body movements. Schizophrenics also suffer from disrupted emotions and behaviors that lead the patient to be dissatisfied with everyday life and lack the ability to endure planned activities. People with schizophrenia often speak without making sense and may sit for extended periods of time without moving. They also express cognitive symptoms such as experiencing difficulty understanding information and paying attention and suffer from memory problems. Therefore, Schizophrenics have difficulty holding jobs and caring for themselves.

Schizophrenia occurs around the world and affects men and women equally. The disease occurs in all ethnic groups at comparable rates. Symptoms commonly arise between the ages of 16 and 30. Schizophrenia rarely occurs in children and usually does not occur in people over the age of 45. Schizophrenia may be difficult to detect in teenagers due to early schizophrenia symptoms, such as irritability, trouble sleeping, a decline in school performance, and feelings of withdrawal from friends and family, being common in this age group. Additionally, men often experience symptoms earlier in life than women.

The causes of schizophrenia are not known. However research has led to conclusions of schizophrenia being influenced by genetics and environmental factors. Complications with chemicals in the brain and neurotransmitters, dopamine and glutamate, may contribute to the development of schizophrenia. Studies involving neuroimaging compare the brain structure and central nervous system of people affected with schizophrenia to those not affected. The comparisons lead schizophrenia to be thought of as a brain disease.  With this, people diagnosed with schizophrenia have differences in their brains. Some differences are the larger fluid-filled cavities in the center of the brain, less gray matter, and some areas of the brain experiencing more, or sometimes less, brain activity.

Moreover, Schizophrenia has been known to run in families. Chances of developing the disorder are higher in people who have first-degree relatives with schizophrenia. Using this, scientists consider several genes to be linked with a higher risk of developing schizophrenia, with no single gene causing the disease in its own. Research has found that people with the disease have higher rates of genetic mutations, which concern hundreds of genes that may disrupt brain development.  According to the National Institutes of Health, studies propose that schizophrenia may result when a gene that is imperative to making brain chemicals errors. Scientists also believe that schizophrenia may develop when there are certain interactions between genes and the environment. Environmental factors such as the introduction of viruses, malnutrition before birth, and problems during birth may contribute to the development of schizophrenia later in life.

Today, it is still unknown what causes schizophrenia.  From that, doctors have to treat symptoms instead of the root problem.  To do so, doctors prescribe antipsychotic medicines such as chlorpromazine, haloperidol, perphenazine, and fluphenazine.  These medicines are older, so doctors refer to them as typical antipsychotics.  More recently developed antipsychotics are referred to as atypical, and examples of these are risperidone, olanzapine, quetiapine, ziprasidone, aripiprazole, and paliperidone.  With all medications, there is a possibility for side effects.  With these antipsychotics, possible side effects are dizziness, drowsiness, blurred vision, rapid heartbeat, skin rashes, sensitivity to sunlight, and menstrual problems for women.  Atypical antipsychotic medications can cause additional problems, including weight gain and metabolic changes.  These side effects can lead to an increased chance of the development of diabetes and high cholesterol.  Typical antipsychotics also have specific side effects.  These antipsychotics can cause problems with physical movement, such as muscle spasms, rigidity, restlessness, and tremors.  Long term use of these typical antipsychotics can cause tardive dyskinesia, which is a condition where a person makes movements they cannot control.  This condition usually affects muscles around the mouth. 

Psychosocial treatment can also be utilized to help patients cope with every day challenges due to their illness (every day care, work, communication, etc.).  Family education can also be helpful in treating a patient.  By working with therapists, families can find ways to develop good coping and problem solving skills for the family and their affected loved one.  Cognitive behavioral therapy can also be used to help patients learn to cope with symptoms of their disease that do not go away with the use of their medications.  Self-help groups can also be good for those with schizophrenia as it gives them another support group to help them feel like they are not alone and find ways to network with each other. 

The following link provides an insight into what life is like for schizophrenic. It describes the life a young girl named Jani who was diagnosed with full blown schizophrenia by the age of six along with other children that currently live with this diagnosis.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B9v4FsKXmj8

The following images compare the brains of normal people to people who suffer from schizophrenia.

What Is Grid-Computing?

Grid-computing is a new computing technology that is now being used to help find cures for many different diseases, global warming, and many other types of scientific research.  With this technology, any technological device that uses a computer brain can be voluntarily signed up to be used to compute different problems.  With the amassed computational power obtained by combining the power of many electronic devices, the computational power created is greater than the power of a supercomputer.  Basically, a problem is first identified by a scientist/researcher.  Once identified, the work of solving the problem is split up into different pieces that are all processed at the same time by many different computational devices during their “idle” time (in the background).  By doing so, every possible way of solving the problem is addressed quickly, reducing the time it takes to research a problem from years to months.  Not only is this a more efficient way of performing research, but it is also less expensive, allowing money to be allocated to other things.

What Is Our Contribution to Schizophrenia?

We will be contributing to the study of Schizophrenia by taking a part of the Mind Modeling grid by downloading its section in the GPU Grid. Mind Modeling is a nonprofit organization that is based in based in Dayton, OH at the Wright State University and the University of Dayton Research Institute. This project not only looks at Schizophrenia but it also focuses on different cognitive problems in order to increase the knowledge of cognitive science. It is geared towards understanding the different cognitive processes that enable human interaction in order to gain a better insight of the human mind.  The section of the GPU Grid from Mind Modeling that we will be contributing to will be assessing the affects of sodium ions have in the binding of anti-psychotic drugs to D2 Dopamine receptors.  Understanding these interactions will be very helpful in future drugs created to treat schizophrenia.  Our computer will be simulating the effects of sodium ions on dopamine receptors in the brain under psychological ionic strength conditions.   

Web Resources:

http://mindmodeling.org/

http://www.webmd.com/schizophrenia/guide/schizophrenia-medications

http://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/topics/schizophrenia/index.shtml?utm_source=publish2&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=www.kpbs.orghttp://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/schizophrenia/basics/definition/con-20021077

http://www.gpugrid.net/science.php?topic=brain