“We then calculated polygenic risk scores for each individual.”

The team drew on extensive genetic and retinal data from the UK Biobank, a vast biomedical database that houses information from more than half a million participants.

“You could say that the scale of the UK Biobank’s data has revolutionized biomedical research,” the researcher adds.

The study found that greater genetic susceptibility to schizophrenia is linked to thinner retinal tissue.

However, the effect size is small and becomes apparent only when examined across large populations.

The researchers also highlighted that unlike brain changes, alterations in the retina can be detected easily, non-invasively, and at relatively low cost, offering a notable advantage.