Abstract
This symposium aims to share knowledge of the importance of investigating brain tissue itself to clarify the pathogenesis of mental illness and how to utilize or/and organize brain banking in the future. The progress in molecular biology facilitated the identification of candidate genes concerning schizophrenia, and most of these genes have a neurodevelopmental function in the CNS. The progress in neuroimaging techniques revealed the morphological brain volume changes of schizophrenia during its course. These studies invigorated neuropathological approaches. We are now on the verge of uncovering the etiology of this disease by integrating cerebral neuroimaging, molecular genetics, and cerebral neuropathology, and its study from the differential approaches might converge with the investigating of brain tissue. In this context, it is important to collect brain tissue and establish the Psychiatric Brain Bank. We have invited two speakers from the Netherlands who have been involved in the Brain Bank from early on. We, the Japanese Society of Biological Psychiatry, are now preparing the Psychiatric Brain Bank in JAPAN, and have much to learn from the pioneers of the brain collection system in EU.
