Biomarkers of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder: Towards Translational Tools to Uncover Underlying Biochemical Profiles

Advances in biotechnology in the era of Genome-Wide Association analyses and multi-omics investigations are shedding light on many previously inaccessible aspects of biomedicine, and this is particularly true for applied research in clinical psychiatry and mental illness. In fact, psychiatric disorders have revealed multifaceted features requiring interdisciplinary assessments and personalized healthcare platforms. If the constant updating of in-depth diagnostic tools for psychiatric illnesses with detailed and more precise criteria and the spread of the concept of psychopathological spectrum of a given behavioral health issue have significantly improved treatment strategies in psychiatry, in parallel, the discovery of new biological substrates underlying mental disorders through the application of emerging biotechnologies are supposed to provide the basis for developing increasingly appropriate therapies.

In this context, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a particularly disabling psychiatric condition demanding highly-specialized medical care. This illness, unlike other forms of severe mental distress, displays characteristics directly related to having experienced a particularly traumatic event, such as involvement in wars, terrorist attacks, natural disasters, pandemics, sudden and/or violent death of loved ones, personal aggression and stalking, discrimination and bullying. Some individuals who have experienced such hardships present patterns of symptoms such as intrusions of negative thoughts, reminiscent perceptions, avoidance behaviors, negative mood and cognition, as well as significant alterations in arousal and reactivity to daily stimuli; causing suffering, functional impairment in work and social activities, also making patients at greater risk of reduced life expectancy. In fact, PTSD patients have been found to be more vulnerable to the onset of chronic somatic illnesses and exposed to the risk of developing suicidal behaviors. Treatments are currently empirical and antidepressants have shown moderate effectiveness, suggesting that neurobiological and biochemical explorations in this field can provide helpful data to discover new avenues of more focused therapeutical interventions.

Translational and/or multidimensional biochemical evaluations, conducted in animal models and patients, are currently among the most promising approaches to introduce into clinical practice appropriate biomarkers of PTSD for use as biological traces and signatures in support of diagnostic interviews and psychometric instruments. In addition to enabling stratification of patients, having valuable biochemical indices correlated with specific symptom clusters, and/or peculiar patterns of resistance and vulnerability to treatment in PTSD can lead to more rapid achievement of therapeutic success, while also reducing relapse, i.e., obtaining an improvement in the patient's quality of life and a return to normal daily functions.

This Research Topic has been conceived with the aim to engage scientists and clinicians conducting investigations on PTSD to find biochemical correlates to be used in monitoring patients by biological assessment at baseline and during clinical follow-up. Narrative or systematic reviews, metanalyses, multicenter surveys, original research articles and longitudinal studies, using traditional or targeted/untargeted omics and multi-omics approaches focused on the detection of neuroendocrine, neurotransmitter, immune-inflammatory and metabolic biomarkers of PTSD symptoms will be mainly considered, together with novel neuroimaging surveys and studies dealing with the search of biochemical changes after acute and chronic stress in animals.