Cognitive Research Collaborations

International collaborations

Genetic research performed by ourselves and other groups has shown that the genetic contribution of individual genes towards the variation in cognition observed between individuals is small (often <1%) and requires a large sample size to detect.

We have recently formed a cognitive consortium with several other research groups in Australia, Holland, Sweden, London, Edinburgh and Manchester. Combined we have access to over 15,000 DNA samples with over half of these having longitudinal data. The main advantages of the consortium include the rapid replication of the findings of individual groups and the ability to detect very small genetic effect sizes. The newly formed consortium has already produced several publications and successfully identified a gene called dysbindin as being association with cognitive ability.

BBSRC project

In 2008, a collaborative grant with the University of Edinburgh using the Dyne-Steele DNA bank was awarded £1.3 million from the BBSRC. This work involves the genotyping of 4000 DNA samples (2000 from each university) for 610,000 genetic variations. This work is a world first and provides us with the best chance, so far, of identifying genes associated with both cognitive ability and its decline with age. The project, starting in September 2008, will be completed in September 2010.

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