Schizophrenia is a debilitating psychiatric disorder that affects
approximately 1% of people worldwide. Previous studies have shown
that patients with schizophrenia have reduced brain volume, smaller
neurons and abnormal brain dopaminergic activity; however, the
mechanism of disease initiation and progression remains unclear. To
investigate these questions, we developed a new method to generate
live human brain cells for the study of schizophrenia. Specifically,
we reprogrammed skin samples from patients with schizophrenia into
stem cells and then differentiated these stem cells into brain cells.
Brain cells from patients with schizophrenia were less connected to
each other and also showed specific differences in gene expression;
some of these defects were improved by treatment with antipsychotic
medications. Our findings are consistent with previous studies of
schizophrenia, validating that it is now possible to study
schizophrenia using live human brain cells generated through our
methods.