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Spectrum: Autism Research News

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Environment

From parental age to infection during pregnancy, environmental elements can influence autism risk.

February 2012

Genetics: Autism, Tourette syndrome genes overlap

by  /  15 February 2012

Genes implicated in Tourette syndrome overlap with those involved in autism, according to an analysis of rare DNA duplications and deletions in people with the syndrome, published in the March issue of Biological Psychiatry.

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Insights for autism from attention deficit hyperactivity disorder

by  /  7 February 2012

Autism and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder show genetic and neurobiological overlap, which may provide clues to the origin of both disorders, says Joel Nigg.

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January 2012

Fishing for folate

by  /  27 January 2012

A new study claims that low folate levels contribute to autism and offers a tenuous explanation for the low levels.

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Genetics: New dataset confirms schizophrenia associations

by  /  27 January 2012

A new study uses data from more than 10,000 typical individuals to validate candidate regions implicated in schizophrenia.

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Effect of paternal age seen in girls with autism

by  /  19 January 2012

Children, especially girls, with autism who have older fathers are more likely than those with younger fathers to be the only child with the disorder in their family, according to a new study published 16 December in Autism.

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The value of blood cells in autism research

by  /  10 January 2012

Blood from individuals with autism could help researchers identify biomarkers to diagnose the disorder and learn more about related symptoms, such as gastrointestinal complaints, says molecular biologist Valerie Hu.

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Clinical research: Twin study links low birth weight to autism

by  /  6 January 2012

When twins differ in their diagnosis of autism, the twin with the lower birth weight is about three times more likely to develop the disorder than his or her sibling, according to a study published in the December issue of Psychological Medicine.

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Research evolution

by  /  3 January 2012

A new study examining trends in autism research over the past 40 years found that the largest areas of growth have been in immune function, oxidative stress, toxin exposure, genetics and neuroimaging, while research on theory of mind and neuropathology has slowed.

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Book review: Autism’s twisted immune links, untangled

by  /  2 January 2012

Research on the immune system’s link to autism and other psychiatric disorders is rich and varied — from massive epidemiological studies of twins and pregnant women, to the screening of immune molecules in amniotic fluid and postmortem studies of brain inflammation. In his new book, Paul Patterson lays out this complicated work clearly and concisely, with little editorializing.

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December 2011

Molecular mechanisms: Master regulator altered in autism

by  /  16 December 2011

SP1, a protein that regulates the expression of several autism candidate genes, could increase risk of the disorder by simultaneously altering the expression of a number of the genes, according to a study published 24 October in Biological Psychiatry.

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