Abstract
The responses of brain metabolism and blood flow to stimulation are diminished in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortexes (DLPFCs) of schizophrenic patients. Reductions in mitochondrial enzymes underlie diminished metabolism in several neurodegenerative diseases. Thus, we tested whether reductions in selected mitochondrial enzymes could underlie the changes in schizophrenia. The activities of the pyruvate dehydrogenase complex (PDHC), aconitase, isocitrate dehydrogenase (ICDH), and the α-ketoglutarate dehydrogenase complex (KGDHC) were determined on DLPFCs from patients with schizophrenia (n=26) and normal nonpsychiatric disease controls (n=13). The enzyme activities (mU/mg protein; mean ± SEM) were similar (values for controls and schizophrenic patients, respectively) for PDHC (11.36 ± 1.5, 10.33 ± 0.8), aconitase (1.06 ± 0.1, 1.35 ± 0.2), ICDH (31.70 ± 2.7, 32.00 ± 2.6), and KGDHC (2.62 ± 0.4, 3.09 ± 0.3). Separate analyses of the patients matched for age or postmortem interval gave similar conclusions. Cognitive dementia rating scores correlated poorly with activities of PDHC, aconitase, ICDH, and KGDHC. In one schizophrenic patient, activity of aconitase was undetectable, and in two others KGDHC activity was very low. Both had low activities of ICDH. A reduced activity of these enzymes in a subgroup is consistent with other data, suggesting that some patients with schizophrenia have abnormalities in brain mitochondria. However, in schizophrenia, unlike a number of neurodegenerative diseases, reductions in the activities of the key mitochondrial enzymes KGDHC and PDHC are not frequent.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Bai C., Fernandez E., Yang H., and Chen R. (1999) Purification and stabilization of a monomeric isocitric dehydrogenase from corynebacterium glutamicum. Protein Expr. Purif. 15, 344–348.
Berman K. F., Torrey E. F., Daniel D. G., and Weinberger D. R. (1992) Regional cerebral blood flow in monozygotic twins discordant and concordant for schizophrenia. Arch. Gen. Psychiatry 49, 927–934.
Blackwood D. H., Muir W. J., Brookes A. J., Gyllensten U., and Jazin E. E. (1997) Mitochondrial sequence variants in patients with schizophrenia. Eur. J. Hum. Genet. 5, 406–412.
Blass J. P. (2002) Glucose/mitochondria in neurological conditions. Int. Rev. Neurobiol. 51, 325–376.
Bray N. J. and Owen M. J. (2001) Searching for schizophrenia genes. Trends. Mol. Med. 7(4), 169–174.
Cavelier L., Jazin E. E., Eriksson I., Prince J., Bave U., Oreland L., and Gyllensten U. (1995) Decreased cytochrome-c oxidase activity and lack of age-related accumulation of mitochondrial DNA deletions in the brains of schizophrenics. Genomics 29(1), 217–224.
Fell D. (1997) Understanding the Control of Metabolism, Portland Press, London, UK, pp. 1–301.
Fucetola R., Newcomer J. W., Craft S., and Melson A. K. (1999) Age and dose dependent glucose-induced increases in memory and attention in schizophrenia. Psychiatry. Res. 88, 1–13.
Gibson G. E., Blass J. P., Huang H. M., and Freeman G. B. (1991) The cellular basis of delirium and its relevance to age related disorders including Alzheimer’s disease. Int. Psychogeriatr. 3(2), 373–395.
Gibson G. E., Haroutunian H., Zhang H., Park L. C. H., Shi Q., Lesser M., Mohs R. C., et al. (2000a) Mitochondrial damage in Alzheimer’s disease varies with apolipoprotein E genotype. Ann. Neurol. 48, 297–303.
Gibson G. E., Park L. C. H., Sheu K. R., Blass J. P., and Calingasan N. Y. (2000b) The α-ketoglutarate dehydrogenase complex in neurodegeneration. Neurochem. Int. 36, 97–112.
Gibson G. E., Zhang H., Sheu K. F. R., Bogdanovich N., Lindsay J. G., Lannfelt L., et al. (1998) α-Ketoglutarate dehydrogenase complex in Alzheimer brains bearing the A-PP670/671 mutation. Ann. Neurol. 44, 679–681.
Gluck M. R., Thomas R. G., Davis K. L., and Haroutunian V. (2002) Increased phosphate-activated glutaminase and glutamic acid decarboxylase activities in dorsolateral prefrontal cortex of aged schizophrenics: implications for altered glutamate and GABA metabolism in schizophrenia. Am. J. Psychiatry 159, 1165–1173.
Gur R. E., Mozley P. D., Resnick S. M., Mozley L. H., Shtasel D. L., Gallacher F., et al. (1995) Resting cerebral glucose metabolism in first-episode and previously treated patients with schizophrenia relates to clinical features. Arch. Gen. Psychiatry 52, 657–667.
Hakak Y., Walker J. R., Li C., Wong W. H., Davis K. L., Buxbaum J. D., et al. (2001) Genome-wide expression analysis reveals dysregulation of myelination-related genes in chronic schizophrenia. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 98(8), 4746–4751.
Haroutunian V., Davidson M., Kanof P. D., Perl D. P., Powchik P., Losonczy M., et al. (1994) Cortical cholinergic markers in schizophrenia. Schizophr. Res. 12, 137–144.
Holcomb H. H., Lahti A. C., Medoff D. R., Weiler M., Dannals R. F., and Tamminga C. A. (2000) Brain activation patterns in schizophrenic and comparison volunteers during a matched-performance auditory recognition task. Am. J. Psychiatry 157, 1634–1645.
Hughes C. P., Berg L., Danziger W. L., Coben L. A., and Martin R. L. (1982) A new clinical scale for the staging of dementia. Br. J. Psychiatry 140, 566–572.
Jacobsen L. K., Hamburger S. D., Van Horn J. D., Vaituzis A. C., McKenna K., Frazier J. A., et al. (1997) Cerebral glucose metabolism in childhood onset schizophrenia. Psychiatry Res. 75, 131–144.
Ksiezak-Reding H., Blass J. P., and Gibson G. E. (1982) Studies on the pyruvate dehydrogenase complex in brain with the arylamine acetyltransferase-coupled assay. J. Neurochem. 38, 1627–1636.
Kung L. and Roberts R. C. (1999) Mitochondrial pathology in human schizophrenic striatum: a postmortem ultrastructural study. Synapse 31(1), 67–75.
Kunz W. S., Kuznetsov A. V., Clark J. F., Tracey I., and Elger C. E. (1999) Metabolic consequences of the cytochrome c oxidase deficiency in brain of copper-deficient Mo (vbr) mice. J. Neurochem. 72(4), 1580–1585.
Maurer I., Zierz S., and Moller H. (2001) Evidence for a mitochondrial oxidative phosphorylation defect in brains from patients with schizophrenia. Schizophr. Res. 48(1), 125–136.
Morton R. I., Ikle D., and White C. W. (1998) Loss of lung mitochondrial activity due to hyperoxia in bronchopulmonary dysplasia in primates. Am. J. Physiol, Lung Cell. Mol. Physiol. 274(1), 1–15.
Park L. C. H., Zhang H., Sheu K. F. R., Calingasan N. Y., Kristal B. S., Lindsay J. G., and Gibson G. E. (1999) Metabolic impairments induces oxidative stress, compromises inflammatory responses, and inactivates a key mitochondrial enzyme in microglia. J. Neurochem. 72, 1948–1958.
Powchik P., Davidson M., Haroutunia V., Gabriel S. M., Purohit D. P., Perl D. P., et al. (1998) Postmortem studies in schizophrenia. Schizophr. Bull. 24, 325–341.
Prince J. A., Blennow K., Gottfries C. G., Karlsson I., and Oreland L. (1999) Mitochondrial function is differentially altered in the basal ganglia of chronic schizophrenics. Neuropsychopharmacology 21(3), 372–379.
Purohit D. P., Perl D. P., Haroutunian V., Powchik P., Davidson M., and Davis K. L. (1998) Alzheimer disease and related neurodegenerative diseases in elderly patients with schizophrenia. Arch. Gen. Psychiatry 55, 205–211.
Reddy R. D. and Yao J. K. (1996) Free radical pathology in schizophrenia: a review. Prostaglandins, Leukot. Essent. Fatty Acids 55, 33–43.
Siegel B. V., Buchsbaum M. S., Bunney W. E., Gottschalk L. A., Haier R. J., Lohr J. B., et al. (1993) Corticalstriatal-thalamic circuits and brain glucose metabolic activity in 70 unmedicated male schizophrenic patients. Am. J. Psychiatry 150, 1325–1336.
Whatley S. A., Curti D., and Marchbanks R. M. (1996) Mitochondrial involvement in schizophrenia and other functional psychoses. Neurochem. Res. 21(9), 995–1004.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Additional information
These authors contributed equally in completing the current study.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Bubber, P., Tang, J., Haroutunian, V. et al. Mitochondrial enzymes in schizophrenia. J Mol Neurosci 24, 315–321 (2004). https://doi.org/10.1385/JMN:24:2:315
Received:
Accepted:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1385/JMN:24:2:315