Genomics in Neurological Disorders

Abstract

Neurological disorders comprise a variety of complex diseases in the central nervous system, which can be roughly classified as neurodegenerative diseases and psychiatric disorders. The basic and translational research of neurological disorders has been hindered by the difficulty in accessing the pathological center (i.e., the brain) in live patients. The rapid advancement of sequencing and array technologies has made it possible to investigate the disease mechanism and biomarkers from a systems perspective. In this review, recent progresses in the discovery of novel risk genes, treatment targets and peripheral biomarkers employing genomic technologies will be discussed. Our major focus will be on two of the most heavily investigated neurological disorders, namely Alzheimer’s disease and autism spectrum disorder.

Keywords

• Brain transcriptome
• Genome-wide association study
• Whole exome sequencing
• Epigenome profiling
• Biomarker