AKT1 and schizophrenia: Importantly, this observation provides a link between the genetics and neurochemistry of schizophrenia and its associated impairment of neuronal function [Akt mediates neuron growth (Dudek et al., 1997; Philpott et al., 1997), soma size (Kumar et al., 2005) and regulates the caliber of neuronal processes (Markus et al., 2002)].