By zapping mouse brains with blue and yellow light beams, scientists have manipulated the animals’ social behaviors and bolstered a popular theory of what causes autism.

Marriages between first cousins are frowned upon in the U.S. and western Europe, but they are common throughout much of the world. A new study shows that these consanguineous unions can help researchers uncover genetic risk factors for neurodevelopmental diseases.

Giving GLYX-13, a drug that targets an autism-associated brain pathway, to rats bred to be less social increases how much they communicate while playing.

The first study to sequence more than 100 genes on the X chromosome in people with autism or schizophrenia has turned up some promising leads.

With a few screen projectors, a pair of three-dimensional glasses and an 8-foot cubicle, researchers have transported adolescents with autism into shaky virtual worlds and discovered that they have surprisingly stable posture.

A study using action potentials, the electrical impulses that trigger signaling, shows that neurons lacking MeCP2, the Rett syndrome protein, have stronger neuronal signals compared with controls, according to a study published in the July Journal of Neurophysiology.

Children with autism often use the wrong pronouns, referring to themselves as ‘you’ in conversation. A new study shows that this difficulty in shifting perspective from other to self may result from impaired connections between brain regions.

Infants with fragile X syndrome spend more time looking at a toy before switching their attention elsewhere than do healthy controls, according to a study published 1 July in the Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders.

The study of any genetic disorder benefits from including the many diverse human populations in our world, and autism should be no different, says geneticist Christopher Walsh.

Only a fraction of autism studies use the gold standard tests to diagnose the disorder in study participants.