NEUROGENETICS & PSYCHIATRIC DISORDERS: Psychiatric
Genetics Group
Professor Jonathan Flint - Group Head
Project: CONVERGE
1 - "Study of Major Depression
in Chinese women"
A CONVERGE collaboration:
China Oxford
and VCU Experimental Research on Genetic
Epidemiology
 
A major new study on the genetics of major
depression in a population of women in China.
The five-year project is funded by a £1.4 million
grant from the Wellcome Trust.
The project is a CONVERGE collaboration, between the
University of Oxford, Hua Shan Hospital (picture below) at Fudan University,
China, and the Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU), USA.
CONVERGE: China Oxford
and VCU Experimental Research on Genetic
Epidemiology
VCU PRess Release
(July 2008)
The project follows on from a successful pilot
project funded by the mental health research charity,
NARSAD.
See:
NARSAD announcement: 8 Jan 2008
Major depression is associated with considerable morbidity
and mortality, as well as substantial economic costs. MORE HERE.
We know that major depression has a genetic component.
This project aims to identify specific genes that make some
people more susceptible than others.
There are two main stages to this project:
Stage 1: Recruitment and Interviews
A project office has been established in Shanghai (China), at
Hua Shan Hospital, Fudan
University (see picture above).
In addition,
15 collaborating
hospitals have been identified in provinces across China.
These hospitals will be responsible to recruit to the study a
total of 6,000 women who have been affected by recurrent, major
depression.
They will also recruit a total of 6,000 age-matched controls
- i.e. women who have never suffered from major depression.
All 12,000 women recruited for the study will be interviewed
using a detailed questionnaire developed specifically for the
project.
In each participating hospital, psychiatrists have received
training on interview protocol and associated quality control
procedures.
This was organised by trainers at the Department of
Psychiatry, Virginia Commonwealth University (USA).
The questionnaire (or 'phenotype' data) will then be entered
into a project database.
Stage 2: Genotyping and Analysis
In the second stage of the project, DNA will be extracted
from saliva samples collected from all interviewed women.
Genotyping will then be carried out to establish the genetic
profiles of both the women affected by depression ('cases') and
those who have never suffered from depression ('controls').
Finally, a case-control study will be conducted to identify
differences in the genetic profiles of these two groups of
women.
This will involve comparing the phenotype and genotype data
collected throughout the course of the project.
The final data from the project will be made freely available
to other researchers.
CLICK HERE
The project is funded by The Wellcome Trust:
It follows on from a pilot project that was
entirely funded by NARSAD:
For further information on the project, please
contact Penny Farrar:
penny.farrar@well.ox.ac.uk
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