What are the earliest signs of autism? Do signs differ between genetically defined autism subtypes? What are cognitive milestones of early development for all children? Is there a way to study these aspects in animal models of autism?
These and other questions surfaced throughout a SFARI-sponsored workshop entitled “Next Steps in Infancy Research on Autism,” held on April 18, 2019. The workshop brought together 12 experts, including those who study child development but not autism, as well as clinicians, geneticists and epidemiologists. The ensuing conversations — part research updates, part brainstorms — touched on measurable aspects of infant development that might be sensitive enough, reliable enough and easy enough to use to help detect, parse and model autism.
Read this story at SFARI.org.
Dan Feldman, a professor at the University of California, Berkeley, studies the rodent somatosensory cortex, which is famous for its organized groupings of neurons, called ”barrels.” There, his lab has been testing an influential idea about autism: the excitatory-inhibitory (E-I) imbalance hypothesis. This proposes that an excess of excitatory signaling relative to inhibitory signaling in the brain leads to symptoms of autism.
The use of fish oils to improve cardiovascular health has been in and out of favour for decades, but positive results from a recent trial of Amarin’s Vascepa have created quite a stir — particularly as they come after a set of negative findings in 2018.
Pinpointing where healthy brain aging leaves off and dementia begins is difficult. Is a slip in memory an expected outcome for a too-busy person or a warning of something else? If an empty-nester loses the motivation to cook, is it a sign that the person is enjoying retirement after a lifetime spent cooking or an early sign of a cognitive decline?
Cell phone chimes, sticky notes, even the proverbial string around a finger—these external cues help guard against inevitable memory lapses. But internal help to the brain itself may be on the way in the form of memory prosthetics. Once considered to be on the fringes of neuroscience, the idea of adding hardware to the brain to help with memory is gathering steam.