A mysterious cluster of sudden deaths among young people who had a genetic syndrome is drawing attention to the high rate of unexplained deaths in individuals with autism and epilepsy.
Researchers have created a mouse carrying a deletion in SHANK3, an autism candidate gene, they reported yesterday in Nature. This is the second model of SHANK3 mutations but shows markedly more behavioral and brain defects compared with the first.
The first international meeting on Phelan-McDermid syndrome brought together researchers and family members of those affected by the disorder, sparking collaboration and some emotion.
The Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee has released an updated list of priorities for government-funded autism research.
A genetic database of autism genes, called Autism Database, or AutDB, details curated information for more than 200 mouse models of autism, according to a report in the January BMC Genomics.
Six strains of mice lacking a gene associated with fragile X syndrome show radically different behaviors though they share the same mutation, researchers reported in January in Autism Research.
One of the first large-scale, ongoing studies documenting the symptoms of Angelman syndrome — a neurological disorder with features similar to autism — is calling into question some of the so-called characteristic symptoms of the syndrome.
Mice exposed to an epilepsy drug show several features of autism, including abnormal social interactions, repetitive behaviors and patterns of super-fast brain waves, called gamma oscillations, according to a study published 15 December in Biological Psychiatry.
Jaundice in newborns is common and usually harmless, but can lead to serious complications, including epilepsy, cerebral palsy and perhaps autism, according to a new study.
The neurons of people with Rett syndrome contain an overabundance of retrotransposons — DNA sequences that copy and insert themselves into new spots throughout the genome — during early development, according to a study published 18 November in Nature.