Smaller-than-normal volume in several brain regions, including a region involved in relaying motor signals, could be a marker for repetitive behavior in 3-year-old children, according to a study published 7 April in Autism Research.

Good mouse models of autism, and accurate tests to assay their phenotypes, are key to both narrowing down a cause and developing effective treatments, argues expert Jacqueline Crawley.

Few scientists have a career that spans as wide a spectrum in autism research as Simon Baron-Cohen, professor of developmental psychopathology at the University of Cambridge in the U.K. And fewer still garner effusive compliments from those who don’t agree with them.

Of 72 newly elected members of the National Academy of Sciences, 7 work either directly on autism or in related areas, illustrating the growing intellectual breadth and depth of the field.

Children with autism who participate in a specialized drama program show improvements in face identification and theory of mind, the ability to infer what others are thinking, according to a study published in the April issue of the Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders.

Family support groups may be the best messengers to convey the urgent need for brain tissue in autism research, say scientists struggling with inadequate resources.

Two rare, unlikely and inherited mutations in the same gene may together have contributed to a case of autism, according to a study published 23 March in Molecular Psychiatry. The results suggest that the gene, DIAPH3, is a new candidate for autism risk.

Mutations in a protein called GRIP1, important for the function of synapses — the junctions between neurons — may contribute to social deficits in autism, researchers reported 22 March in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Neurons that respond to the same stimuli are grouped into sub-networks that can quickly communicate with each other, according to a study published 10 April in Nature.

At 12 months of age, infant siblings of children with autism have a brain response to unfamiliar faces that is characteristic of typical children at a younger age, according to a study published 26 March in Brain Topography. This developmental delay could be used as an early biomarker for autism.