Preprint Article Version 1 Preserved in Portico This version is not peer-reviewed

Construction of a Neuro-Immune-Cognitive Pathway-Phenotype Underpinning the Phenome of Deficit Schizophrenia

Version 1 : Received: 20 October 2019 / Approved: 20 October 2019 / Online: 20 October 2019 (17:21:05 CEST)

How to cite: Al-Hakeim, H.K.; Almulla, A.F.; Al-Dujaili, A.H.; Maes, M. Construction of a Neuro-Immune-Cognitive Pathway-Phenotype Underpinning the Phenome of Deficit Schizophrenia. Preprints 2019, 2019100239. https://doi.org/10.20944/preprints201910.0239.v1 Al-Hakeim, H.K.; Almulla, A.F.; Al-Dujaili, A.H.; Maes, M. Construction of a Neuro-Immune-Cognitive Pathway-Phenotype Underpinning the Phenome of Deficit Schizophrenia. Preprints 2019, 2019100239. https://doi.org/10.20944/preprints201910.0239.v1

Abstract

In Schizophrenia, pathway-genotypes may be constructed by combining interrelated immune biomarkers with changes in specific neurocognitive functions that represent aberrations in brain neuronal circuits. These constructs provide insight on the phenome of schizophrenia and show how pathway-phenotypes mediate the effects of genome X environmentome interactions on the symptomatology/phenomenology of schizophrenia. Nevertheless, there is a lack of knowledge how to construct pathway-phenotypes using Partial Least Squares (PLS) path modeling and Soft Independent Modeling of Class Analogy (SIMCA). This paper aims to provide a step-by-step utilization guide for the construction of pathway-phenotypes that reflect aberrations in the neuroimmune - brain circuit axis (NIBCA) in deficit schizophrenia. This NIBCA index is constructed using immune biomarkers (CCL-2, CCL-11, IL-1β, sIL-1RA, TNF-α, sTNFR1, sTNFR2) and neurocognitive tests (Brief Assessment of Cognition in Schizophrenia) predicting overall severity of schizophrenia (OSOS) in 120 deficit SCZ and 54 healthy participants. Using SmartPLS path analysis, a latent vector is extracted from those biomarkers and cognitive tests, which shows a good construct reliability (Cronbach alpha and composite reliability) and replicability and which is reflectively measured through its NIBCA manifestations. This NIBCA pathway-phenotype explains 75.0% of the variance in PHEMN (psychotic, hostility, excitation, mannerism and negative) symptoms. Using SIMCA, we constructed a NIBCA pathway-class that defines deficit schizophrenia as a qualitatively distinct nosological entity and which allows patients with deficit schizophrenia to be authenticated as belonging to the deficit schizophrenia class. In conclusion, our nomothetic approach to develop a nomological network combining neuro-immune and neurocognitive phenome markers to predict OSOS and cross-validate a diagnostic class generated replicable models reflecting the key phenome of the illness, which may mediate the effects of genome X environmentome interactions on the final outcome phenome features, namely symptomatology and phenomenology.

Keywords

deficit schizophrenia; machine learning; cytokines; cognition; inflammation; neuro-immune

Subject

Medicine and Pharmacology, Psychiatry and Mental Health

Comments (0)

We encourage comments and feedback from a broad range of readers. See criteria for comments and our Diversity statement.

Leave a public comment
Send a private comment to the author(s)
* All users must log in before leaving a comment
Views 0
Downloads 0
Comments 0
Metrics 0


×
Alerts
Notify me about updates to this article or when a peer-reviewed version is published.
We use cookies on our website to ensure you get the best experience.
Read more about our cookies here.