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Didenur Sahin Cevik, M.Sc., PhD Candidate Bilkent University, Turkey

Didenur Sahin Cevik, M.Sc.

I have always been captivated by understanding how the brain develops and how certain factors, such as genetics and life experiences, can shape a person’s vulnerability to mental health disorders such as schizophrenia. During my PhD studies under the supervision of Prof. Dr. Timothea Toulopoulou, I had the opportunity to work with both patients and healthy individuals, focusing on understanding the brain mechanisms involved in psychosis. Specifically, I am interested in how genetic and environmental factors like childhood trauma shape brain function. Psychosis, especially schizophrenia, is a complex disorder that affects how people think, feel, and behave. One way it impacts the brain is through changes in connectivity between different regions, particularly those involved in working memory—the ability to hold and manipulate information over short periods of time. By combining functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) with twin data, I aim to better understand how brain connectivity is altered in people at risk for developing schizophrenia and how environmental and genetic factors affect these mechanisms. This research is important because it helps us understand not only the disruptions in the brain but also how some individuals seem to be more resilient to the effects of environmental stressors like trauma.

At the 2024 SIRS conference, I had the honor of receiving the Early Career Award, which provided a unique opportunity to present the findings of my latest study on the genetic resilience for schizophrenia and environmental risk on brain connectivity of adolescent twins. Schizophrenia is characterized by disruptions in the functional integration of working memory brain networks. Exposure to environmental risks during critical periods of brain development can disrupt the typical trajectory of brain maturation and increase the risk of schizophrenia. Investigating how genetic resilience, defined as a heritable measure of variation that increases resistance to disease by reducing the impact of risk loci, influences this link is critical to understanding the disorder’s causal mechanisms. To this aim, we collected fMRI data from 350 healthy twins oversampled for familiar schizophrenia risk. Functional connectivity indexes were calculated for each participant. We examined whether connectivity patterns in areas such as the paracingulate gyrus (PCG) and precentral area were predicted by environmental risks and how the polygenic resilience score for schizophrenia moderated this relationship. We found that genetic resilience moderated the relationship between environmental risk (discrimination and childhood trauma) and functional connectivity. For example, in individuals with lower levels of genetic resilience, childhood trauma reduced connectivity in the precentral region of the brain. Similarly, individuals who had lower levels of genetic risk discrimination decreased connectivity in the PCG. Individuals with higher genetic resilience did not show decreased connectivity in the same regions. Our findings underscore the interplay between genetics, environmental risk, and the neural mechanism in building resilience to schizophrenia. As PCG and precentral are relevant in schizophrenia, optimal connectivity in these regions may enhance a person’s ability to cope with adversity. The moderating role of genetic resilience highlights the importance of gene-environment interactions in investigating neural mechanisms responsible for genetic resilience to adversity.

Attending the SIRS conference as a young researcher was an invaluable opportunity. Not only was I able to share my findings with experts in the field, but I also had the opportunity to connect with researchers from all over the world. The chance to engage in discussions with other scientists and receive feedback on my research has been an invaluable experience.

Currently, I am in the final semester of my PhD and looking forward to continuing my research in the field of psychosis as a postdoc. I am passionate about continuing to work on how genetic and environmental risk factors shape brain development and may promote vulnerability to psychotic diseases by implicating brain mechanisms. Ultimately, my goal is to deepen the understanding of the neurobiological underpinnings of psychotic disorders to help develop early intervention strategies.

 

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