A common NTRK2 variant is associated with emotional arousal and brain white-matter integrity in healthy young subjects

• Published in: Translational psychiatry 2016-03, Vol.6 (3), p.e758-e758
• Main Authors: Spalek, K, Coynel, D, Freytag, V, Hartmann, F, Heck, A, Milnik, A, de Quervain, D, Papassotiropoulos, A
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: 631/378/340; 631/477/2811; Adolescent; Adult; Arousal - genetics; Behavioral Sciences; Biological Psychology; Diffusion Tensor Imaging; Emotions; Female; Genetic Variation; Genotype; Healthy Volunteers; Humans; Male; Medicine; Medicine & Public Health; Membrane Glycoproteins - genetics; Neurosciences; Original; original-article; Pharmacotherapy; Polymorphism, Single Nucleotide; Protein-Tyrosine Kinases - genetics; Psychiatry; Receptor, trkB; White Matter - diagnostic imaging; Young Adult
• ISSN: 2158-3188; 2158-3188
• DOI: 10.1038/tp.2016.20

Dysregulation of emotional arousal is observed in many psychiatric diseases such as schizophrenia, mood and anxiety disorders. The neurotrophic tyrosine kinase receptor type 2 gene ( NTRK2 ) has been associated with these disorders. Here we investigated the relation between genetic variability of NTRK2 and emotional arousal in healthy young subjects in two independent samples ( n 1 =1171; n 2 =707). In addition, diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) data in a subgroup of 342 participants were used to identify NTRK2 -related white-matter structure differences. After correction for multiple testing, we identified a NTRK2 single nucleotide polymorphism associated with emotional arousal in both samples ( n 1 : P nominal =0.0003, P corrected =0.048; n 2 : P nominal =0.0141, P corrected =0.036). DTI revealed significant, whole-brain corrected correlations between emotional arousal and brain white-matter mean diffusivity (MD), as well as significant, whole-brain corrected NTRK2 genotype-related differences in MD ( P FWE