Two new strains of mice allow researchers to monitor and manipulate brain cells called astrocytes.

Genes that are expressed at higher levels in men’s brains than in women’s also tend to be enriched in the brains of people with autism.

A new study casts brain cells called astrocytes as minor stars in Rett syndrome, a disorder that almost exclusively affects girls.

A new cell culture method allows researchers to easily transform skin cells into layered spheres of firing neurons.

Brains from people with autism have more support cells called glia and fewer neurons than do control brains, suggests a study published 10 January in Molecular Autism.

Postmortem brains from individuals with autism have astrocytes that are smaller but denser than in control brains, according to a study published 21 September in the Journal of Neuroinflammation. The researchers found similar alterations in a mouse that lacks the autism-linked gene NLGN3.