The blood pressure drug bumetanide normalizes a deficit in brain activity in two rodent models of autism, according to a study published last week in Science. The study hints at a mechanism underlying the drug’s benefits for people with autism.

Watch the complete replay of Michael Merzenich discussing how the brain’s ability to change with experience may lead to new treatments for autism.

Studies at the level of neural circuits are needed to better understand the importance of both increased and decreased connectivity between different regions in the autism brain, say John Rubenstein and Vikaas Sohal.

Skin cells taken from mice with an autism-linked mutation and transformed directly into neurons have the same properties as neurons from the brains of these mice. The study, published 8 October in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, validates an efficient technique to study disease-linked mutations.

Emerging findings in children with autism are showing both hyperconnectivity and underconnectivity in different regions and circuits throughout the brain.

A new imaging technique that can assemble finely detailed pictures of an individual mouse’s brain in less than a day is being used to explore mouse models of autism. Data from the first two models were presented Wednesday at the 2013 Society for Neuroscience annual meeting in San Diego.

Researchers have shown for the first time that glitches in a gene expressed at junctions between neurons can cause gut problems in mice. The unpublished results were presented Tuesday at the 2013 Society for Neuroscience annual meeting in San Diego.

Activating cells in the cerebellum, a brain region usually associated with movement, eliminates seizures in a mouse strain that normally has hundreds of seizures a day, according to results presented Saturday at the 2013 Society for Neuroscience annual meeting in San Diego.

Mutations in GABRB3, a brain receptor linked to autism, are prevalent in severe childhood epilepsy, according to a study published 12 September in Nature.

Newborn mice with an autism-linked mutation in neuroligin-3, which stabilizes junctions between neurons, have abnormal brain chemistry, according to a study published 4 June in Frontiers in Cellular Neuroscience.