VCU awarded Wellcome Trust Foundation grant to study molecular genetics of depression

The team will carry out a whole genome association analysis, which assesses variation throughout the human genome through the analysis of between 500,000 and 1 million genetic markers. Their results, genotypes and phenotypes, will be made freely available through a Web accessible database.

In July 2007, VCU hosted a week-long training session for a delegation of psychiatrists from China involved in the research.

The delegation's visit was the result of VCU's partnership with Fudan University and Beijing Foreign Studies University, part of VCU's efforts to internationalize its campuses. During his presidency, VCU President Eugene P. Trani has established significant linkages with 15 universities around the world, including in the Middle East, Europe, Africa and Asia.

During the workshop held at VCU's Virginia Institute for Psychiatric and Behavioral Genetics, attendees were instructed on how to assess depression in study participants using detailed research instruments. This involved learning some new interview skills through role playing. These interview skills differ from those used to asses clinic patients on a daily basis. Also, the nuances of questioning used to assess clinic patients differs from how questioning is done in a scientific research setting. There are also a variety of layers to the research interview process, which is estimated to take approximately 60 to 90 minutes.

Following the workshop, the delegates returned to China to train other doctors in various health systems on how to assess for depression among study participants and to begin data collection. Kendler, along with Lisa Halberstadt, also with the VCU Department of Human Genetics, visited Shanghai in September 2007 to assist with the training program.

About VCU and the VCU Medical Center: Virginia Commonwealth University is the largest university in Virginia and ranks among the top 100 universities in the country in sponsored research. Located on two downtown campuses in Richmond, VCU enrolls nearly 32,000 students in 205 certificate and degree programs in the arts, sciences and humanities. Sixty-five of the programs are unique in Virginia, many of them crossing the disciplines of VCU's 15 schools and one college. MCV Hospitals and the health sciences schools of Virginia Commonwealth University compose the VCU Medical Center, one of the nation's leading academic medical centers. For more, see www.vcu.edu.