{"id":237462,"date":"2026-05-20T03:54:26","date_gmt":"2026-05-20T08:54:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2026\/05\/neutrophils-manufacture-schizophrenia-linked-protein-according-to-new-research"},"modified":"2026-05-20T03:54:26","modified_gmt":"2026-05-20T08:54:26","slug":"neutrophils-manufacture-schizophrenia-linked-protein-according-to-new-research","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2026\/05\/neutrophils-manufacture-schizophrenia-linked-protein-according-to-new-research","title":{"rendered":"Neutrophils manufacture schizophrenia-linked protein, according to new research"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/neutrophils-manufacture-schizophrenia-linked-protein-according-to-new-research.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>The most common white blood cells in your body\u2014immune cells called neutrophils\u2014can make a protein nobody knew they were making, Stanford Medicine investigators have discovered. That unexpected sighting joins a growing list of hints tying schizophrenia, a disorder of the brain, to events occurring elsewhere in our bodies. The findings are summarized in a <a href=\"http:\/\/www.pnas.org\/doi\/10.1073\/pnas.2536376123\" target=\"_blank\">paper published<\/a> in Proceedings of the National Academy of Science.<\/p>\n<p>The newly noticed neutrophil nexus, as a source of the protein called C4A, links a long list of other observations that are somewhat puzzling when looked at in isolation: For example, large-scale population-genetic studies have identified C4A, already known to be produced mainly in the liver, as a pronounced risk factor in schizophrenia. People with schizophrenia tend to have increased numbers of neutrophils in their blood. And the most effective medication for schizophrenia inhibits neutrophils.<\/p>\n<p>Schizophrenia affects one in every 100 persons globally almost without variation by geography or ethnicity. Its most noticeable symptoms are hallucinations, delusions and fixations. A fundamental feature of the disease is cognitive impairment: inability to think clearly, reduced working memory, disorganized thinking and behavior.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The most common white blood cells in your body\u2014immune cells called neutrophils\u2014can make a protein nobody knew they were making, Stanford Medicine investigators have discovered. That unexpected sighting joins a growing list of hints tying schizophrenia, a disorder of the brain, to events occurring elsewhere in our bodies. The findings are summarized in a paper [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":662,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,412,47],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-237462","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-biotech-medical","category-genetics","category-neuroscience"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/237462","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/662"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=237462"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/237462\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=237462"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=237462"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=237462"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}