Scientists have identified several autism-specific variants in a gene that lies within a chromosomal region linked to the disorder, according to a poster presented at the World Congress of Psychiatric Genetics in San Diego.

Variations linked to autism and schizophrenia crop up in people with a large variety of conditions, including bipolar disorder, seizures and obsessive-compulsive disorder, as well as in healthy people. This notion gained new support from unpublished data presented at the World Congress for Psychiatric Genetics in San Diego.

A new mutation in the neuroligin-4 (NLGN4) gene, one of the few genes convincingly tied to autism, has been found in two brothers with autism, further implicating the gene in the disorder, scientists reported in the Journal of Neuroscience.

A newer version of the psychiatric manual may expand the definition of autism, folding in Asperger syndrome and pervasive developmental disorder not otherwise specified.

Although the head overall is bigger in some children with autism, researchers have found more informative differences in size — some smaller, some larger — across regions of the brain.

There are well-established paternal age effects in diseases less common than autism. A new paper in Nature Genetics explains how the effects might arise, and it involves a kind of tumor you’ve probably never heard of.

A pathway involved in language development is increasingly proving to be important in autism, suggest a series of new studies on cellular and behavioral aspects of the disorder.

Giving mouse models of Rett syndrome access to toys, wheels and contact with other mice rescues motor skill and other deficits characteristic of the disorder, according to results presented in a poster session Wednesday at the Society for Neuroscience meeting in Chicago.

Mice lacking a gene located in the chromosomal region 22q13 — which has been linked to autism — have motor learning and social deficits reminiscent of the disorder, according to unpublished findings presented in a poster session yesterday at the Society for Neuroscience meeting in Chicago.

Antibodies directed against the fetal brain are present in some mothers of children with autism, confirming previous findings and suggesting that the antibodies could be used as a marker for the disorder, according to unpublished research presented yesterday at the Society for Neuroscience meeting in Chicago.