A critical translational infrastructure for studying risk and protection mechanisms in a population neuroscience approach, the effects of intervention, and innovative study designs are cohorts. ZI-HUb has a nationally unique portfolio of cohorts specifically tailored to psychiatric translation:
These include
(a) epidemiological longitudinal cohorts (EU-IMAGEN, DFG-MARS, CRC636, BMBF-POSEIDON , BMBF-PEZ),
(b) clinical cohorts (EU-TACTICS, EU-AGGRESSOTYPE, BMBF-MooDs, EU-CoCA, EU-MATRICS, EU-AIMS/AIMS2, DFG-GRK2350, BMBF-IMAC-Mind, BMBF-ESCAlife, BMBF-ADOPT, BMBF-ASD-Net, , BMBF-ESPRIT, BMBF-IntegraMent, KFO 256 and GRK 2350 (BPD), EU-MATRICS, TRR 265, CRC1158) and
(c) large international consortia (ENIGMA-ADHD, ENIGMA-ASD, ENIGMA-CD, PGC ADHD/Anxiety, EU-IMAGEMEND).
POSEIDON is a longitudinal cohort of 410 parents and infants studied in late pregnancy, at birth, 6 and 45 months and 9 years aimed at identifying the effect of perinatal stress on the methylome and phenotype of the offspring. The cohort is translationally integrated in a cross-species (rodent, non-human primate, humans) multi-omic approach covering different tissues (brain, T-cells, buccal cells, saliva), stressors as well as different developmental time points of adversities.
PEZ is an ongoing accelerated longitudinal cohort of 700 children, adolescents and young adults with yearly assessments recruited by stratified random selection via the local registration authorities. It acquires a broad range of clinical, psychological, multimodal neuroimaging, genetic, epigenetic, endocrinological and EMA measures (including sensor and geolocation tracking data) across vulnerable developmental periods for a quantitative characterization of the genetic and environmental risk and protection architecture of participants.
ZI is one of the most active recruitment sites of IMAGEN, a European longitudinal study of adolescents on reinforcement behaviors (i.e., impulsivity, reward sensitivity, and emotional processing) in normal development and psychopathology. At the age of 14, over 2000 participants were assessed and followed up in 3 waves until the age of 22 (follow-up 3, ongoing: n > 1300) using neuroimaging, GWS, EWAS and questionnaires assessing psychopathology and socioenvironmental context to identify psychobiological mechanisms predicting the development of clinically relevant symptoms in adolescents and disease course. Using multilevel data integration, IMAGEN identified a multivariate prediction profile including personal history, personality and neural domains. For cross-validation, clinical cohorts of 800 patients (aged 19–25) with major depression, AUD, psychosis and controls are recruited in the EU STRATIFY project.
The Mannheim Study of Children at Risk (MARS) is prospective study of long-term outcomes of early psychosocial and biological risk following children since birth (N=300). Starting at 3 months, longitudinal information on mental health, personality traits, sociodemographic status and genetic variability was collected prospectively up to 33 years, including longitudinal imaging combined with ambulatory assessments to identify developmental trajectories and predictive biopsychosocial markers for psychopathology. Future assessment will involve the families of the MARS participants to study transgenerational transmission of risk and protection.
ZI is a recruitment site of the National Cohort (NAKO) study with a dedicated 3T research MRI.
CPM hosts several carefully characterized (multimodal neuroimaging, neuropsychology, hormones, genetics) cohorts, including 400 patients with borderline personality disorder, 300 depression patients, 230 eating disorder patients, a transdiagnostic cohort with comprehensive data on early adversity, 500 patients with schizophrenia and affective disorders and 400 traumatized refugees from the registration center at Patrick-Henry Village in Heidelberg with comprehensive clinical data (START). Detailed longitudinal treatment data is available from primary care and specialized outpatient cohorts (N=600; including videos) and inpatient (N=3,600) psychotherapy settings.