Identification Of Candidate Genes For Complex Diseases

National Institute Of Mental Health

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Abstract

We focus on identifying candidate genes in restricted regions of the genome identified by linkage studies of complex genetic diseases, i.e. those which are not expected to show perfect cosegregation with any single locus. With our collaborators in NHGRI, we have identified transcripts in the vicinity of HPC1, a gene for early onset prostate cancer, and have obtained full-length cDNAs for 13 new genes. We have begun to apply these methods to loci for bipolar disorder and schizophrenia. We have assembled 17 mB of finished and unfinished sequence from the Human Genome Project to cover an approximately 15 cM region spanning the 13q32 region of chromosome 13 implicated by linkage analysis in both bipolar disorder and schizophrenia. We have identified more than 40 genes within this region. We have obtained full length or nearly full length cDNAs for a number of new genes. A number of these genes are attractive candidates and we have begun to characterize polymorphisms within these candidate genes.