Source: Time
A new report shows the brains of autistic children, who suffer from the disorder tied to a combination of contributing factors from genes to the environment, have differences in regions that develop during the mother’s second trimester of pregnancy
While autism is almost certainly the result of a combination of contributing factors, from genes to environmental exposures such as pollution, scientists say some of those influences may start during pregnancy.
In a report published in the New England Journal of Medicine, researchers found that the brains of autistic children showed differences in certain regions that normally develop in the second trimester of pregnancy.
Working with autopsy brains of 11 children with autism and 11 children without the disorder who were between the ages of two and 15 years, the scientists focused on 25 genes responsible for specific nerve cell types in the outer layer for the brain, what’s known as the cortex.
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“The outcome was fascinating,” says Ed Lein, one of the co-authors of the paper and an investigator at the Allen Institute for Brain Science. “The regions seemed to correspond to the functional symptoms of autism.”
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