A team from Emory University used more than 1200 donated post-mortem brains to identify 10,200 proteins for sex-based differences. From the 10,200 proteins, 1200 of them showed differences in expressed levels based on biological sex. As the article explains, "They assessed protein expression between alleles with single nucleotide polymorphisms and looked for pQTL differences to determine if sex influenced this allele expression" (The Scientist). Ultimately, they found that these 1200 proteins corresponded to about 150 proteins with sex-based expression. The team compared these proteins to other sex-based proteins associated with psychiatric, neurologic, or morphologic traits and found 35 similarities. The team currently believes that with extended research, time, and genomic studies, this data could improve treatments and therapeutic remedies in the future.
While reading about the research done, I found it important to take note of such a big sample size provided by the donation of the brains but also from the 10,200 proteins found during the study, having a large protein database can offer a lot to a study. The connection that was shown between specific protein expression levels and neurological conditions is crucial to understanding the condition itself but can also lead to other benefits. The findings could hopefully help those affected by these neurological conditions by refining treatments that accommodates these specific proteins and reviewing treatment plans in general.
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