Biology News Article

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News Article Summary
Scientists have long been in a debate on the link between the genetic architecture and neuropsychiatric disorders. In recent research conducted by neurologist Gandal and colleagues has established that there is a correlation between a differential gene expression for the different psychiatric diseases and the relative presence of some particular single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNP). The researchers elude that a transcriptome in the human brain is a molecular signature that is characteristic of the neurodegenerative diseases. As such, the researchers suggest that this study reveals that the psychiatric diseases such as autism (ASD), schizophrenia (SCZ), bipolar disorder (BDD), depression (MDD), and alcoholism (ADD) have a genetic base (Taylor, 1). The researchers conducted their study through a postmortem on a sample size of 700 brains. Researchers already knew that genetic variants might facilitate or act as a predisposing factor for the development of psychiatric diseases (Taylor, 1). However, there is little literature to explain the extent by which gene activity alters the brain structure hence leading to psychiatric diseases; a factor that Gandal and colleagues resorted to studying.
Compare and Contrast
On a general view, the article is precise in articulating Gandal’s results, and there is no exaggeration. However, the sample size is manipulated and not precisely stated. In the primary article, the researchers elude that they conducted a postmortem on 715 brains while the article states it as 700.

Also, the news article fails to identify the composition of the sample. In contrast, the primary article outlines the composition of the sample as; ASD-33, SCZ-141, BD-75, MDD-68, and ADD- 17 (Gandal et al., 4). Unlike the news article which merely states the controls, the primary article clearly outlines the non-psychiatric controls that were employed; that is, 381 matched non-psychiatric controls. Another major strength of the primary article is the use of batch re-balancing to nullify any bias arising from biological or technical errors. Moreover, in the Methods section, the researchers use weighted gene co-expression network analysis to establish the genetic overlap across the case psychiatric disorders. The primary article is also precise in presenting the results; the presence of microglial activation as well as a synaptic phenotype can be linked to the early onset of the autism disorder (Gandal et al., 14).
However, what is not clear in Gandal’s research is that the genes identified or SNPs do not give a clear picture of how the gene expression occurs in real life. Furthermore, research needs to be dedicated to identifying how this understanding of gene expression may contribute to designing treatment for the psychiatric disorders.
Works Cited
Taylor, A.P. Gene Expression Overlaps Among Psychiatric Disorders. The Scientist. February 8, 2018. Retrieved from: https://www.the-scientist.com/?articles.view/articleNo/51636/title/Gene-Expression-Overlaps-Among-Psychiatric-Disorders/Gandal, Michael J., et al. “Shared molecular neuropathology across major psychiatric disorders parallels polygenic overlap.” bioRxiv (2016): 040022. (1-17). Retrieved from: https://www.biorxiv.org/content/biorxiv/early/2016/02/18/040022.full.pdf