About 2 percent of people who have both autism and intellectual disability carry harmful mutations in SHANK3, a protein that helps organize the connections between neurons, according to a study published 4 September in PLoS Genetics.
A new method of statistical analysis can predict whether a rare mutation identified in someone with autism has a meaningful association with the disorder or was found only by chance, researchers reported in the September issue of Nature Genetics.
As they age, children with fragile X syndrome may become worse at adapting to change, according to a study published 28 July in Pediatrics.
Children with autism often appear to be clumsy, but in fact the disorder may protect them from injury, suggests a study published in the July-August issue of Academic Pediatrics.
To characterize people who carry deletions in 16p11.2 and 15q13.3, genetic regions linked to autism, two studies published this summer looked in detail at dozens of people with either deletion. The studies found that deletions in these regions lead to diverse symptoms that only sometimes include autism.
Autism pioneer Uta Frith reminisces about dramatic shifts in British researchers’ understanding of autism that effectively ended the institutionalization of children with the disorder.
Mutations in a gene linked to intellectual disability and sometimes autism may lead to a permanent boost in brain activity, according to a study published 18 June in Neuron.
Children who have both the rare genetic disorder tuberous sclerosis complex and autism show a gradual drop in nonverbal intelligence between 1 and 3 years of age, according to research published 11 June in Neurology.
CHD8, a gene that regulates the structure of DNA, is the closest thing so far to an ‘autism gene,’ suggests a study published today in Cell. People with mutations in this gene all have the same cluster of symptoms, including autism.
The severity of core autism symptoms in young children goes hand in hand with the degree of the children’s difficulty with motor tasks.