Gene/Protein Disease Symptom Drug Enzyme Compound
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Query: UMLS:C0025362 (mental retardation)
 15,878 document(s) hit in 31,850,051 MEDLINE articles (0.00 seconds)

Common diseases are usually the consequence of a variety of etiologies. This rule applies, for example, to mental retardation and epilepsy. There is evidence that genetic factors influence the propensity to utilize alcohol on an addictive basis at two levels of interaction between the drug and the body. It is doubtful that psychiatric symptoms are specific for defined etiologies. Individuals who are heterozygous for autosomal-recessive alleles may show slight deviations toward the homozygous genotype. These findings are applied to a polygenic concept of psychiatric disorders. Data are presented that would be compatible with a slightly increased incidence of heterozygotes for Wilson's disease and metachromatic leucodystrophy in psychiatric patients.
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PMID:Studying biological vulnerability and heterogeneity--a long way ahead. 332 39

The total content of zinc in the adult human body averages almost 2 g. This is approximately half the total iron content and 10 to 15 times the total body copper. In the brain, zinc is with iron, the most concentrated metal. The highest levels of zinc are found in the hippocampus in synaptic vesicles, boutons, and mossy fibers. Zinc is also found in large concentrations in the choroid layer of the retina which is an extension of the brain. Zinc plays an important role in axonal and synaptic transmission and is necessary for nucleic acid metabolism and brain tubulin growth and phosphorylation. Lack of zinc has been implicated in impaired DNA, RNA, and protein synthesis during brain development. For these reasons, deficiency of zinc during pregnancy and lactation has been shown to be related to many congenital abnormalities of the nervous system in offspring. Furthermore, in children insufficient levels of zinc have been associated with lowered learning ability, apathy, lethargy, and mental retardation. Hyperactive children may be deficient in zinc and vitamin B-6 and have an excess of lead and copper. Alcoholism, schizophrenia, Wilson's disease, and Pick's disease are brain disorders dynamically related to zinc levels. Zinc has been employed with success to treat Wilson's disease, achrodermatitis enteropathica, and specific types of schizophrenia.
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PMID:Zinc, the brain and behavior. 708 16

A 5-year-old boy visited a hospital because of macrocephalus, mental retardation and hepatic dysfunction, and was suspected to have Wilson's disease since his father had this disease. The serum level of ceruloplasmin was low, but urinary copper excretion was not increased markedly. He was treated with D-penicillamine. He was then reffered to our hospital because of his facial features suggesting mucopolysaccharidosis. Based on mucopolysacchariduria and the deficiency of N-acetylglucosaminidase, the diagnosis of Sanfilippo syndrome type B was made. Molecular analyses identified him as a compound heterozygote for both the ATP7B (A844V/2659delG) and alpha-N-acetylglucosaminidase (V241M/R482W) genes, responsible for Wilson's disease and Sanfilippo syndrome type B, respectively. Although born to non-consanguineous parents, he had two rare autosomal recessive diseases. In this case, liver dysfunction was attributed to Wilson's disease, and mental retardation to Sanfilippo syndrome.
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PMID:[Case of Sanfilippo syndrome type B and Wilson disease born to unrelated parents]. 1644 97