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Biomarker for Autism

Research project

Active research

Project owner

Institutionen för neurovetenskap och fysiologi

Area

Health and medicine

Topic

Neuroscience Immunology in the medical area Pediatrics

Short description

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a collective name for certain neuropsychiatric disabilities. Identifying early biomarkers can help discover underlying biochemical causes of ASD, improve early identification, and help monitor the outcome of pharmaceutical treatments. The aim of our project is to understand how infections in premature infants interact with genetic factors that increases the risk of autism in order to identify early biomarkers of autism and therefore identify new therapeutic targets.

Project background

Preterm birth and its associated complications are among the most serious global health issues that modern society faces. Particularly, extreme prematurity (<28 gestational weeks) is associated with a marked elevated risk for Autistic Spectrum Disorders (ASD). Active neuroinflammatory processes have been detected in postmortem brain tissue from autistic patients. It has been suggested that the combination of premature birth and susceptibility genes may make infants more vulnerable to environmental factors such as infections after birth, thus contributing to autism pathogenesis. In support, we showed that neonatal inflammation in preterm mice resulted in autistic like phenotype with correspond neuropathological changes.

Further, we proposed that neonatal inflammation could induce susceptibility to neurodevelopmental disorders through modification of hippocampal gliovascular interface in a sex-dependent manner. Despite the considerable progress in this area, many important questions remain, particularly regarding the mechanisms by which environmental or intrinsic signaling regulates sequential circuit integration with the consequence of brain development impairment. Accordingly, the current project will identify important autistic-related biomarker profiles to better understanding of the underlying mechanisms and therefore enable early and both more precise diagnoses and more effective treatment of ASD in the future.