While driving, this woman noticed something strange…so she jumped in.Source: The Autism Site

What causes autism? It depends on whom you ask. An anatomist might say that brain circuits are wired in unusual ways in people with autism. A scientist who studies synapses, the places where neurons connect, might blame faulty junctions. A geneticist might focus on changes in gene expression, and a …

LeeAndra Chergey is a mother first, then wife, and now she can add author. Writing has been her dream since she was in the second grade. “After procrastinating on a report on the bumblebee, I quickly wrote up a paragraph and turned it in. The next day the teacher held up my paper and said to t…

Genetic variants tied to autism may also influence social skills in people without the condition, supporting the notion that autism lies along a continuum of typical traits. The findings, published Monday in Nature Genetics, also bolster the idea of a broad autism phenotype, or mild features of auti…

Sequencing the whole genomes of individual mouse neurons reveals that each cell carries roughly 100 unique mutations that set it apart from its neighbor. The findings, described 3 March in Neuron, may clarify how so-called ‘somatic mutations,’ which crop up after conception in a subset of the body’s…

Switched On has gone on sale today, and people are already reading and talking about it. The book tells the story of my participation in experiments where Harvard neuroscientists used high-powered magnetic energy to “switch on” the ability to see emotions in other people. One effect of the experimen…

One of the things that’s seldom mentioned is the role of philanthropy in autism.  By directing their donations, private philanthropists have significantly shaped the direction of both autism research and the public image of autism.In 1977, Nancy Lurie Marks found nowhere to turn when she looked…

Mito… a progressive disease that affects almost every part of my body in some way. In fact, it’s almost certain that whatever the genetic error that has caused my mito is responsible for my autism as well, as autism is pretty common in mito. Suffice to say that I’ve had more than a few h…

The post Brain change; biobank first; family ties appeared first on Spectrum. Source: Spectrum News

Babies with autism are thought to be late to meet physical milestones, such as pointing and sitting. But a new report finds that most babies with autism and intellectual disability take their first steps — a major motor milestone — on time or earlier than those with other conditions that affect cogn…

Forget the proverb ‘opposites attract:’ A massive Swedish study suggests that men and women who have a psychiatric condition such as autism, schizophrenia or attention deficit hyperactivity disorder tend to pair up with people who share their diagnosis1. This nonrandom mating pattern, described 24 F…

By Nils Skudra I have been interested in the American Civil War from approximately five years old, and at this time I began to draw a great many pictures of historical scenes, primarily detailing that particular conflict and era. I also developed an interest in the American Revolution, World War I, …

When I was a young woman raising my son with autism in the 1990s, we had a home computer. It was considered a luxury item then, but for us it was essential, helping us to connect with other people involved in the early days of the disability rights movement and with other families affected by autism…

Bringing together pop-culture and technology, it was about time that Silicon Valley hosted a Comic Con event. If you don’t know what a Comic Con is, where have you been? It began in 1970 when 100 comics, movie and science fiction fans wanted to come together to celebrate what they loved with their l…