INSAR 2022

Recent articles

Woman sits on a hospital bed and looks out of a window.

Psychiatric conditions hospitalize almost one in three autistic women by age 25

The findings, based on Swedish national registry data, suggest a critical need to expand mental health services for autistic people.

By Niko McCarty
31 October 2022 | 3 min read
Lab mice (Mus musculus), tribe Balbc, three 13 day old babies with eyes still closed, laying side by side

Sleepy mice with autism-linked mutation struggle to fall asleep

Mice with a mutated copy of SHANK3 fail to establish normal sleep patterns during development.

By Peter Hess
12 September 2022 | 3 min read
A woman in a white lab coat uses a micropipette

Modified CRISPR tool boosts UBE3A levels in mice

A deactivated form of the gene editor restores UBE3A expression in mice and human neurons without cutting the genome. It may hold promise for future Angelman gene therapies.

By Niko McCarty
20 May 2022 | 4 min read

Structural brain changes foretell language skills in autistic infants

Increased white-matter maturation tracks with stronger language abilities later in childhood, but the relationship with cortical thickness is less clear.

By Angie Voyles Askham, Peter Hess
19 May 2022 | 4 min read

Researchers publish new dataset on minimally verbal autistic people

Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology published the first repository of vocalizations from minimally verbal autistic people. Those with few or no spoken words still produce a range of phonemes, or units of sound, that may serve as developmental markers or intervention targets.

By Shelby Grebbin
18 May 2022 | 4 min read
Child in dark room with thermometer showing 100.8.

Fever doesn’t ease challenging traits in most autistic children

The findings contradict a previous study, whose design may have been biased to find an effect.

By Angie Voyles Askham
17 May 2022 | 3 min read
Young woman sitting alone at window in the shadows.

Autistic LGBTQ+ people report frequent mental health problems

The co-occurring conditions may stem from the heightened stress people in minority communities experience.

By Niko McCarty
16 May 2022 | 2 min read
Three views of zebrafish.

Novel gene linked to brain size in autistic people

The gene, YTHDF2, may be one of several that contribute to an autism subtype marked by an unusually big brain.

By Laura Dattaro
16 May 2022 | 2 min read

Clinicians lack confidence in diagnostic interviews with Black mothers

Implicit biases might be to blame, and the discrepancy persists across clinics, regardless of maternal education, family income and a child’s IQ score.

By Niko McCarty
13 May 2022 | 4 min read
Speech bubble formed by a network of communication

INSAR Community Newsletter: Tweets & murmurs from Day Three

We are covering the talks in Austin, Texas, this week, plus what the research community is talking about online, in the Lone Star Ballroom and around town.

By Spectrum
13 May 2022 | 5 min read

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Rajesh Rao reflects on predictive brains, neural interfaces and the future of human intelligence

Twenty-five years ago, Rajesh Rao proposed a seminal theory of how brains could implement predictive coding for perception. His modern version zeroes in on actions.

By Paul Middlebrooks
18 December 2024 | 97 min listen

In memoriam: Yves Frégnac, influential and visionary French neuroscientist

Frégnac, who died on 18 October at the age of 73, built his career by meeting neuroscience’s complexity straight on.

By Bahar Gholipour
18 December 2024 | 9 min read
Illustration shows a solitary figure moving through a green and blue field of dots moving at different rates.

Explaining ‘the largest unexplained number in brain science’: Q&A with Markus Meister and Jieyu Zheng

The human brain takes in sensory information roughly 100 million times faster than it can respond. Neuroscientists need to explore this perceptual paradox to better understand the limits of the brain, Meister and Zheng say.

By Claudia López Lloreda
17 December 2024 | 8 min read