Area of brain linked to bipolar disorder pinpointed
"Our study is one of the first to locate possible damage of bipolar disorder in specific subfields within the hippocampus," said Bo Cao, Ph.D., first and corresponding author and a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at McGovern Medical School at UTHealth. "This is something that researchers have been trying to answer. The theory was that different subfields of the hippocampus may have different functions and may be affected differently in different mood disorders, such as bipolar disorder and major depression disorder." Cao hopes the study, which was funded in part by the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), will pioneer future research on details within the hippocampus as a marker for precise diagnosis and positive treatment response of bipolar disorder. Approximately 6 million Americans suffer from bipolar disorder. Bipolar I disorder is characterized by mood changes that can swing from a high-energy, manic st...