As I've previously written I find neuroscience fascinating. I like to explore different areas related to the neuroscience. Today I read an article about such devastating disease as schizophrenia. Schizophrenia typically appears in adolescence. Adolescence is the developmental period during which synaptic pruning takes place. While humans are developing, excess synapses are produced. A synapse is where information transmission takes place in the brain. During synaptic pruning, a so-called tidying up is going on. Useful synapses continue to exist, and less useful synapses are pruned. While this process is taking place, less useful excess synapses are tagged by the protein C4A. These synapses are then removed by microglia, which are part of immune system. So, the researches who are trying to investigate the causes behind schizophrenia suggest that excessive synaptic pruning may lie behind this devastating disease. They conduct experiments on genetically modified mice that have the human protein C4A incorporated into them. However, it is not only the protein C4A that takes part in synaptic pruning; there is also a gene, CSMD1, that also affects synaptic pruning. This particular gene is more useful for creating an effective drug therapy because it is active only in the brain, whereas the protein C4A is distributed throughout the body, and it can be risky to target the protein C4A during drug therapy.