Functional dysconnectivity in schizophrenia and its relationship to neural synchrony

Abstract

Schizophrenia is a debilitating disorder of unknown cause. There is increasing momentum to consider functional dysconnectivity as an endophenotype of schizophrenia, and in particular, how it relates to cognition as a core feature of the disorder. Here, the authors review the conceptual models of functional dysconnectivity in schizophrenia to date, the evidence they are based on and some of the limitations of these models. The authors then propose ‘neural synchrony’ as a potential mechanism for functional dysconnectivity and review the current state of evidence for a link between neural synchrony and cognition in schizophrenia across behavioral, physiological, brain imaging, neurochemical and neurogenetic units of enquiry. The authors conclude by outlining the unmet needs in this field and give an outlook on how to fill these gaps.

Keywords::

• γ synchrony
• biological mechanism
• circuits
• cognition
• functional connectivity
• genes
• neurons
• neurotransmitters
• schizophrenia

Acknowledgements

A National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) project grant (APP1004822) held by LM Williams and AWF Harris supported this work. AM Brennan was supported by a Westmead Medical Research Foundation Young Initiating Grant, an Australian Rotary Health Ian Scott Scholarship and an NHMRC Postgraduate Scholarship (APP1055392).

Financial & competing interests disclosure

AWF Harris has received consultancy fees from Eli Lilly and Lundbeck Australia. He has received payments for educational sessions run for Astra Zeneca, Janssen-Cilag, Eli Lilly and Reed Business Information. He has been an investigator on industry sponsored trials for Hoffman-La Roche, Janssen-Cilag Australia and Brain Resource Ltd. LM Williams received fees from BR for work unrelated to this study. LM Williams was on the Advisory Board for Pfizer Australia for ziprasidone. The authors have no other relevant affiliations or financial involvement with any organization or entity with a financial interest in or financial conflict with the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript apart from those disclosed.

No writing assistance was utilized in the production of this manuscript.