Symposium at the 2017 ESCAP Congress (Geneva) on Neuroimaging markers of risk for severe mental disorders, organized by the Swiss National Centre of Competence in Research – Synapsy.
Chair: Dr Camille Piguet (University of Geneva).

Abstract
As we improve our understanding of major psychiatric disorders such as bipolar disorder or psychosis, the need to better assess the risk to develop such a disease has become more prominent. In particular, studies with "at risk" population target the biomarkers of disease vulnerability. Here we aim to present data on neuroimaging biomarkers of high risk status for psychosis and bipolar disorder that could indicate functional or structural vulnerability traits of those diseases.

Programme

• Brain structural and functional connectivity correlates of the onset of psychosis – professor Stefan Borgwardt (Department of Psychiatry, University of Basel, Switzerland).
• Greater surface area, gyrification and volume of the right inferior frontal gyrus as markers of genetic risk for bipolar disorders – professor Tomas Hajek (Department of Psychiatry, Dalhousie University, Canada).
• Investigating functional neural network vulnerability in high-risk offspring of bipolar disorder parents – Dr Kallia Apazoglou (Department of neuroscience, University of Geneva, Switzerland).
• Neuroimaging biomarkers of stress reactivity and working memory disruption in children and adolescents at risk – professor Aysenil Belger (Department of Psychiatry University of North Carolina at Chapel HIll, USA).