Unlocking the Mystery: How Vitamin A Influences Mental Health

A research team from Newcastle has been investigating how vitamin A influences the development of psychiatric conditions.

Professor Murray Cairns of the University of Newcastle and Hunter Medical Research Institute said the connectivity between neurons in the brain is thought to be altered in people with schizophrenia and other psychiatric conditions.

“Our previous research suggests this could be to do with vitamin A levels or retinol levels, which are known to play an important role in the differentiation, maturation, and synaptic function of brain cells.

“Our new study by William Reay and colleagues combined the summary statistics from thousands of individual genomes to find out what genetic factors regulate retinol levels in blood. We essentially matched retinol levels with variation in genes to give us a better understanding of the genes involved in retinol absorption and transport in the blood,” says Professor Cairns.