Today, the prevalence of depression in adults and children is growing at an alarming rate, yet modern medicine remains limited. Scientists agree that depression has multiple causes, and genetics plays a significant role in the development of this mental disorder. Since 2017, an international team of researchers has been studying the genetic characteristics of depression in thousands of patients from 29 countries and has discovered nearly 300 new genetic variants associated with the diagnosis. The results are published on the website of the Berghof Medical Research Institute.
In total, the scientists analyzed data from 680,000 patients and compared it with data from 4 million healthy individuals. This helped nearly double the number of genetic variants predisposing to depression: scientists now know of 697 depression biomarkers in the genome.
It is known that each genetic variant has a small impact on the risk of depression, but several variants combined increase the likelihood of developing the disease. Scientists now have the ability to test on the largest database yet, which should significantly improve the quality of depression diagnosis and treatment. For example, understanding the involvement of specific genes can help adapt existing depression treatments or develop new ones that target previously unknown targets.
Recently, other scientists presented an AI system that can detect depression within five minutes with 97% accuracy. The diagnosis is based on voice and brain activity analysis.
