This week a 5 country collaboration including the largest number of people EVER revealed 80% of the causes of autism are heritable. This is incredibly important to understand autism and move forward with research that matters to families. What it did not do was calculate the role of gene x environment interactions which seems to be the forgotten stepchild of autism research. This week’s #ASFpodcast explains why it is important to understand the heritability while at the same time study the combined effects of genetic and environmental factors.
Podcast: Genes, environment and heritability: why does it matter?
This week a 5 country collaboration including the largest number of people EVER revealed 80% of the causes of autism are heritable. This is incredibly important to understand autism and move forward with research that matters to families. What it did not do was calculate the role of gene x environment interactions which seems to be the forgotten stepchild of autism research. This week’s #ASFpodcast explains why it is important to understand the heritability while at the same time study the combined effects of genetic and environmental factors. Listen to the podcast here.
Once again, this week another study came out dismissing the link between vaccines and autism. Add this one to the list, but this is one of the largest and takes into account genetic and non-genetic risk factors. It continues to discredit the vaccine-autism link. However, in other science, more evidence that prenatal folic acid supplementation, something women should be doing anyway, does reduce the probability of having a second child with autism. So take your folic acid – either by prescription or over the counter. As Martha Stewart says, it’s a good thing to do. Listen to the podcast here.
Twins with autism, where either one or both is diagnosed, is crucial to understand the role of genetics and the environment to both autism diagnoses and now, autism traits. In a study this week, researchers using data from the California Twins Study examined the genetic and environmental influences of brain development in multiple regions and measures. While estimates of genetic and environmental influences can only be modeled in twins, they can be experimentally tested in animal models. Researchers at the University of Washington investigate what causes the link between air pollution in humans and autism by studying diesel fuel exhaust in pregnant mice. Finally, across all of these disparate animal studies – does anything pull them together. Are these models all one-offs or do they have anything in common? It turns out disruption in normal brain activity is one thing that they have in common, and something that is at the common core of ASD neurobiology. Listen to the podcast here.