Grant: CIHR Fellowship

Mood disorders such as bipolar disorder (BD) is common and often chronic, exacting a tremendous toll from individuals and society. Many studies of bipolar patients and their relatives have shown that BD can run in families. For example, in studies of identical twins, scientists report that if one identical twin has BD, the other twin has a greater chance of developing BD than another sibling in the family. Recent advances in genetic technology have identified some commonly occurring genetic variants in the DNA, which may be linked to BD. However, research suggests that rare or low frequency exon variants (sequences which code information for protein synthesis) might have a large effect on human health. But, research is still missing on rare variants occurring in the population that may be linked to an increased risk for BD. This study proposes one of the largest studies to date to document and identify rare DNA variants, which may be over represented in BD patients when compared to healthy individuals. Specifically, DNA has been collected from approximately 4000 BD patients and 4500 healthy patients. Next generation sequencing technology will be used to catalogue rare variants in the exons of all genes in the human DNA. Finally, the sequences from BD patients will be compared to DNA sequences from healthy people. I hope that this work, in time, will aid genetics-driven strategies to develop new drugs or new therapies and help reduce the burden of mood disorders in our society.