Recent Progress of Novel Approaches in Mood Disorders

In recent decades, the dramatic technical changes in methods for measuring gene expression and epigenetic modification is to transform from selected candidate gene studies to well-powered, unbiased genome-wide profiling studies. These genome-wide profiling methods were represented as DNA microarray and mRNA sequencing which provide not only hypothesis-free approaches but also distinct and significant changes of targeted tissues including brain tissues and peripheral blood from mood disorder patients. The novel emerging single cell sequence, spatial RNA sequence, and ATAC-sequence provide more novel information than previous gene expression systems. Some transcriptomic and epigenetic studies have been reported and provided some critical information on the pathophysiology of mood disorders, there is much more to be gained through transcriptomic work in the field of stress disorders and basic research in this area is needed to identify promising therapeutic targets.

The goal of this research topic is to provide an overview of the current understanding and fundamental discoveries in the field of transcriptome and epigenetic mechanisms of the depression and suicide.

We welcome submissions of various types of manuscripts, including original papers, reviews, and methods, including but not limited to:

• Single cell sequencing and spatial sequencing in neurobiology of the mood disorder

• Epigenetic modification, such as chromatin structure and epitranscriptome in the mood disorder field

• Multi-omics and integrated analysis of GWAS, epigenetics and RNA sequencing

• Comparative overlap of animal models with postmortem findings