Chitta R. Nayak

Decreased serum levels of interleukin-2 and interleukin-6 in Indian Bengalee schizophrenic patients

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE Autoimmune process is thought to be involved in the pathophysiology in some cases of schizophrenia. Alteration in interleukin (IL) regulation is regarded as additional proof of autoimmunological background in schizophrenia. Most of the research in interleukin activity in schizophrenia has been in Caucasian and some Mongoloid patients. We have studied the serum IL-2 and IL-6 level in psychotropic medication free and antipsychotic medicating schizophrenic patients who are Indian Bengalee by ethnicity. METHOD Twenty psychotropic medication free and 30 antipsychotic medicating schizophrenic patients who fulfilled DSM-IV-TR criteria and 30 of the same age and sex matched controls were recruited. Serum level of IL-2 and IL-6 were measured by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA). RESULT There was a significant decrease of IL-2 and IL-6 in both antipsychotic medicating and psychotropic medication free patients. Further the medicating patients showed lower level of IL-2 and IL-6 than the psychotropic medication free patients. CONCLUSION This is the first study to describe a decrease serum level of IL-6 in schizophrenic patients. The study provides the evidence that some kind of immune dysregulation is involved in pathophysiology of schizophrenia. The study also provides the evidence for the immunosuppressive effect of antipsychotic drugs.

Genetic associations between delusional disorder and paranoid schizophrenia: A novel etiologic approach.

Objectives: Genetic associations between delusional disorder and paranoid schizophrenia are not well understood, although involvement of biological factors has been suspected. We investigated the incidence of human leukocyte antigen (HLA) class I alleles in patients with delusional disorder and paranoid schizophrenia, first, to explore a possible immunogenetic etiology of these paranoid disorders and, second, to determine whether they share similar etiologic mechanisms. Method: We employed a nested case–control study design. Psychiatric reference data were available for 38500 patients attending a hospital-based psychiatric outpatient department between 1998 and 2005. We enrolled 100 patients with delusional disorder and 50 patients with paranoid schizophrenia as the subject cases, using DSM-IV criteria. We considered equivalent numbers of healthy volunteers matched for age and ethnic background as control subjects. All subjects came from an India-born Bengali population. We applied the polymerase chain reaction–based molecular typing method to all patients and healthy subjects. Results: The HLA-A*03 gene is significantly associated with delusional disorder as well as with paranoid schizophrenia. This HLA gene alone or in linkage disequilibrium with other HLA genes or other closely linked non-HLA genes may influence susceptibility to delusional disorder and paranoid schizophrenia. Conclusions: The study reveals important associations between HLA genes and paranoid disorders. Delusional disorder and paranoid schizophrenia may share similar etiologic mechanisms. This preliminary observation may help our understanding of the genetic basis of these paranoid disorders.

Study of Selected HLA-A and-B Antigens by PCR-SSP Method in Bengali Population of Siliguri and Adjoining Areas of West Bengal

Abstract Human leukocyte antigen is a highly polymorphic gene cluster which has made it a valuable tool in the population genetic studies. In this study one hundred individuals belonging to Bengali community of Siliguri subdivision of West Bengal were studied for 20 of the HLA-A and B loci. The HLA alleles were analyzed by using sequence specific primers for polymerase chain reaction (PCR-SSP). The result showed the increase frequency of HLA-A*02, -A*11, -A*24, -A*31, - B*07, -B*08, and-B*37 amongst the tested alleles. The notable observation of this study is the higher incidence of HLA-B*37 and-B*08 which is observed to be the highest amongst the Indian populations. The two-locus haplotype analysis revealed significant positive linkage disequilibrium for A*01-B*37, A*01-B*40, A*29-B*40, A*30-B*51, A*31-B*40. The study provides the HLA data of the Bengali population of this region.

Analysis of the role of human leukocyte antigen class-I genes to understand the etiopathology of schizophrenia.

Background: Schizophrenia is the paradigmatic illness of psychiatry. The involvement of immunological and immunopathological mechanisms in the etiopathogenesis of schizophrenia has been a matter of research, with recently increasing effort. Aims: In this study, we investigated the incidence of human leukocyte antigen (HLA) Class I antigens to understand the role of HLA genes in schizophrenia. Materials and Methods: India born schizophrenic patients in and around Siliguri who attended outpatient department (OPD) of Department of Psychiatry, North Bengal Medical College and Hospital were considered for the present study. After the longitudinal follow up, 50 patients were enrolled for the study. The same number of age, sex and ethnically matched healthy subjects were considered as control. Low resolution polymerase chain reaction-sequence specific primer method was applied for typing the HLA antigens. Statistics: The phenotype frequencies were calculated by direct count. χ2 test was done to compare the frequency of each antigen among the patients and control group and it was followed by Fishers exact test. Relative risk was estimated by using Haldanes method. Results: The result showed that some of the HLA antigens are associated with the schizophrenia and significant increase were observed for HLA A*03 antigen along with the significant decrease for HLA A*25, A*31 and HLA B*51. Conclusions: The study provides the evidence for the possible existence of susceptibility locus for schizophrenia within the HLA region. This preliminary observation may help to understand the etiological basis of this disorder and the study may further strengthen the HLA antigens as the marker for schizophrenia.

Immunomodulation in schizophrenia: A study among the Indian schizophrenia patients of Siliguri, West Bengal

Authors investigated the circumstantial evidence for autoimmunity in schizophrenia patients of Siliguri by considering the immune parameters like HLA Class I genes, IL-2 and IL6 and T cell subsets. Low resolution PCR-SSP method was applied for typing the HLA genes. Serum levels of IL-2 and IL-6 were measured by ELISA method. The CD4+ and CD8+ subset count were done using flow cytometry. A significant increase in HLA A*03 gene was observed in patients along with the significant decrease of HLA-A*31 and HLA-B*51. Both IL-2 and IL-6 were found to have decreased levels in the patients. Although the mean percentage of CD4+ and CD8+ cells was higher in patients but not significantly higher than controls. These cumulative preliminary findings are suggestive of alterations in the immune system of schizophrenia patients of this region.

Dopamine Receptor Gene D1 Reveals No Significant Association with Delusional Disorder on the Basis of SSP Analysis

Abstract Dysregulation of dopaminergic neurotransmission has been implicated in the etiology of major psychoses. The dopamine D1 receptor (DRD1) plays a role in some brain functions and mechanisms of psychotropic drugs. Therefore, the DRD1 gene makes a good candidate gene for molecular genetic study in delusional disorder. In the present investigation, the association has been studied between DRD1 gene and delusional disorder patients. No association was found between the DRD1 gene and delusional disorder, either in the whole group of patients or in subgroups divided by disease type or predominance of DRD1 positive or negative patients. Moreover, there were no significant differences observed between the delusional disorder patients and normal healthy controls when they were compared for different clinical and demographic variables. These findings suggest that this gene may not be involved in the pathogenesis of delusional disorder.

The numerical evaluation of theH-functions of radiative transfer in active amplifying media

The present paper contains extensive tables of the values of theH-functionH(z,ω<0) and of the moments ofQ(x) (in terms of which the moments ofH(z, ω) can be determined) appropriate for transfer of radiation in active amplifying media in whichω<0. These values have been computed correct to the 7th decimal place for values ofω in the range (−10−12)-(−1030) and for values of zΦ[0,1] with the aid of a 48-point gaussian quadrature formula.