An association study of tachykinin receptor 3 gene with schizophrenia in the Japanese population

The tachykinin receptor 3 (TACR3) gene encodes the neurokinin3 (NK3) receptor. Animal studies showed that agonist-induced stimulation of the NK3 receptor leads to the excessive release of dopamine in the ventral and dorsal striatal and prefrontal cortical regions. Data from clinical trials of selective NK3 receptor antagonists in schizophrenia have shown significant improvement in positive symptoms. We performed an association study of the TACR3 gene in the Japanese population of 384 schizophrenic patients and 384 controls. Nine single nucleotide polymorphisms were genotyped using TaqMan assays and polymerase chain reaction-restriction fragment length polymorphism method. No significant association between schizophrenia and these single nucleotide polymorphisms was observed in single-marker and haplotype analyses. Our results suggest that TACR3 is unlikely to be related to the development of schizophrenia in the Japanese population.