Vol 3 n° 1 - Genetic Approach to Neuropsychiatric Disorders
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1 E d i t o r i a l Dear Colleagues, Genetics, the study of heredity and variation, is a fairly young branch of science. Carried by the impetus of much-publicized recent discoveries, and in spite of its short history, modern genetics now seems to eclipse all other disciplines. Psychiatrists and neurologists have long been fascinated by the genetics of mental disorders. The familial aggregation of certain types of psychosis had not escaped the attention of 19th century clinicians. As early as 1838, the French psychiatrist Esquirol remarked in his treatise that heredity was one of melancholia’s main etiological factors. Traditionally, researchers have focused their attention on the familial transmission of dis- ease. In psychiatry, this approach was foiled by the complex and multifactorial causation of mental disorders, which generally do not follow the clear rules of mendelian genetics. The recent advances in genome research have opened up new vistas. We can work with new con- cepts, which would hardly have been imaginable a few decades ago. We now have a better understanding of the interactions between gene expression and the environment. For certain disorders, gene therapy seems a less distant prospect. We are likely to witness great strides in the field of psychiatric drug treatment, with the rapid identification of molecular targets, the elucidation of interindividual differences in treatment response, and the discovery and screen- ing of numerous new drugs. We are indebted to Drs Margret R. Hoehe and Deborah J. Morris-Rosendahl, who have shaped this issue of Dialogues in Clinical Neuroscience. They carefully selected renowned spe- cialists and asked them to report on key areas of progress. Best wishes, Jean-Paul Macher, MD Marc-Antoine Crocq, MD