Scientists Study Stem Cells to Better Understand Bipolar Disorder

Statistics show that 5.7 million adult Americans suffer from bipolar disorder. That's 2.6 percent of the U.S. population age 18 and up every year, according to the National Institute of Mental Health. The sixth leading cause of disability in the world, the disorder results in a 9.2 year reduction in expected life span, and as many as one in five patients with bipolar disorder will commit suicide. Yet a new study shows that stem cells offer hope for a better understanding into the complexities of the health issue.

Researchers from the University of Michigan Health System used skin from people with bipolar disorder to transform stem cells into neurons. When they compared these neurons witho those taken from individuals who did not suffer from the disorder, they found that bipolar individual's neuron's "behaved and communicated with each other" in very different ways. The researchers also discovered that the two groups of neurons responded to the mood stabilizer lithium in a very different manner.

"This gives us a model that we can use to examine how cells behave as they develop into neurons. Already, we see that cells from people with bipolar disorder are different in how often they express certain genes, how they differentiate into neurons, how they communicate, and how they respond to lithium," said study co-leader Sue O'Shea, Ph.D., the experienced U-M stem cell specialist , via a press release. 

With future studies, researchers hope that stem cells could bring a new understanding to the disorder.

"We're very excited about these findings. But we're only just beginning to understand what we can do with these cells to help answer the many unanswered questions in bipolar disorder's origins and treatment," said Melvin McInnis, M.D., principal investigator of the Prechter Bipolar Research Fund and its programs, via the release. "For instance, we can now envision being able to test new drug candidates in these cells, to screen possible medications proactively instead of having to discover them fortuitously."

What do you think?

More information regarding the findings can be seen via the journal Stem Cells and Development.