Autism breakthrough: One protein's sweeping influence on development of autism revealed
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As many as a third of autism cases could be explained by a scarcity of a single protein in the brain, Toronto
scientists have revealed.
The findings provide a unique opportunity to develop treatments for a disorder that is
rooted in a motley crew of genetic faults.
Researchers induced autistic-like behaviour in mice by lowering the levels of a protein called nSR100 (also known as
SRRM4), which is important for normal brain development.
The study, published in the December 15 issue of the
journal Molecular Cell, builds on the teams' previous work which showed that the nSR100 protein was reduced in
the brains of autistic people.
The teams were led by Professors Benjamin Blencowe of the University of Toronto's Donnelly Centre and Sabine
Cordes of the Department of Molecular Genetics and Sinai Health System's Lunenfeld-Tanenbaum Research
Institute.
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