Poorly designed animal drug studies for motor disorders have led to spurious conclusions for the clinical trials that follow. This may be even more true for autism research, says Michael Ehlers.
The equivalent of one-tenth of a single pill of the anxiety drug clonazepam alleviates many autism-like behaviors in a mouse model of the disorder, according to a study published 19 March in Neuron.
Prebiotics — nutrients that promote the growth of some beneficial gut bacteria — can influence brain chemistry and behavior. New findings suggest prebiotics as treatments for people with neurological disorders, say Sarkis Mazmanian and Gil Sharon.
Families and schools spend about $17,000 more per year on a child with autism than they do on a typically developing child, reports a study published in the March issue of Pediatrics.
Aripiprazole, one of two autism drugs approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to treat autism symptoms, may be no more effective than a placebo after a few months.
Treatment with the hormone oxytocin boosts brain activity and improves recognition of emotions in people with autism, according to two small studies published in February.
Evidence is finally accumulating that early diagnosis and behavioral interventions improve the lives of people with autism. Even so, increasingly the question isn’t just whether early intervention works but also the best age at which to intervene.
More than 70 percent of autism studies don’t record the ethnicity of their participants, and fewer than half of those that do analyze the impact of the data, reports a review published 4 February in the Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders.
Watch the complete replay of Kevin Pelphrey discussing how imaging can chart social cognition in the brains of children with autism.
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.