Seaside Therapeutics, a small biotech, and Swiss pharmaceutical giant Roche have announced a partnership to develop drugs for fragile X syndrome and autism.

Men with a common autism-linked variant of CD38, a gene that regulates levels of the ‘trust hormone’ oxytocin, benefit more from the hormone than do those with other variants, according to a study published in the May issue of Neuropsychopharmacology.

Luca Santarelli, head of neuroscience at Roche, explains why he is optimistic that pharmaceutical companies can overcome the obstacles in autism drug development.

A tool designed to detect psychiatric disorders in people with autism may produce more accurate estimates of co-occurring conditions.

A new rat study shows that the precise timing of early valproate exposure, an autism risk factor, can have a big influence on behavior later in development.

Immune cells called microglia may play a central role in trimming synapses, the connections between neurons, according to research published 24 May in Neuron. These modifications are part of a normal developmental process by which excess synapses in the brain are destroyed.

Preliminary research shows that in people with autism, oxytocin enhances activity in brain areas that process social information.

Two reviews sketch a road map for understanding and treating autism in low- and middle-income countries.

A new initiative launched by the National Institute of Mental Health aims to redefine clinical trials for autism by funding short, biomarker-based studies that will allow investigators to quickly rule out ineffective compounds. 

Researchers typically use only one ‘cohort,’ a group of about three dozen mice, for a given set of experiments. When others repeat the experiments with a different set of animals, sometimes the results hold up, and sometimes they don’t.