http://www.physorg.com/ en-us Physorg.com internet news portal provides the latest news on science including: Physics, Nanotechnology, Life Sciences, Space Science, Earth Science, Environment, Health and Medicine. Researchers long ago rejected the theory that vaccines cause autism, yet many parents don't believe them. Can scientists bridge the gap between evidence and doubt? http://www.physorg.com/news162625234.html Medicine & Health Wed, 27 May 2009 06:41:01 EST news162625234 For 20 years, Maurie Ange of El Cerrito, Calif., suffered from chronic belly aches. A decade ago, she was diagnosed with irritable bowel syndrome and told to exercise more and increase her fiber intake. But the pain, bloating and digestive issues continued into her 60s. http://www.physorg.com/news162212457.html Medicine & Health Fri, 22 May 2009 12:01:30 EST news162212457 (PhysOrg.com) -- UCLA scientists have discovered a variant of a gene called CACNA1G that may increase a child's risk of developing autism, particularly in boys. The journal Molecular Psychiatry publishes the findings in its May 19 advance online edition. http://www.physorg.com/news161974145.html Medicine & Health Tue, 19 May 2009 17:50:31 EST news161974145 Research published this week in the Journal Autism, published by SAGE, estimate the annual costs of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) to be more than £27 billion a year. The costs of supporting children with ASDs were estimated to be £2.7 billion per year, £25 billion each year for adults. The findings will be presented at the Autism & Employment Workshop taking place today at Goldsmiths, University of London. http://www.physorg.com/news161847176.html Medicine & Health Mon, 18 May 2009 06:33:38 EST news161847176 (AP) -- Leo Lytel was diagnosed with autism as a toddler. But by age 9 he had overcome the disorder. His progress is part of a growing body of research that suggests at least 10 percent of children with autism can "recover" from it - most of them after undergoing years of intensive behavioral therapy. http://www.physorg.com/news161026455.html Medicine & Health Fri, 08 May 2009 18:34:47 EST news161026455 California saw a 12-fold increase during the past two decades in the number of autistic people who are receiving services through regional centers, a new state study reveals. http://www.physorg.com/news160906373.html Medicine & Health Thu, 07 May 2009 09:13:22 EST news160906373 (PhysOrg.com) -- Researchers at MIT's Picower Institute for Learning and Memory have shed light on how a protein implicated in cognitive disorders maintains and regulates brain cell structures that are key to learning and memory. http://www.physorg.com/news160755604.html Medicine & Health Tue, 05 May 2009 15:21:10 EST news160755604 Toddlers with autism appear more likely to have an enlarged amygdala, a brain area associated with numerous functions, including the processing of faces and emotion, according to a report in the May issue of Archives of General Psychiatry, one of the JAMA/Archives journals. In addition, this brain abnormality appears to be associated with the ability to share attention with others, a fundamental ability thought to predict later social and language function in children with autism. http://www.physorg.com/news160675501.html Medicine & Health Mon, 04 May 2009 17:05:24 EST news160675501 "Timely identification and diagnosis of an autism spectrum disorder (ASD) can impact a child's development and is the key to opening the door to the services and therapies available to children with autism," says Paul Shattuck, Ph.D., assistant professor at the George Warren Brown School of Social Work at Washington University in St. Louis. "Unfortunately, our research shows that the average age of autism diagnosis is nearly six years old, which is three to four years after diagnosis is possible." http://www.physorg.com/news160673874.html Medicine & Health Mon, 04 May 2009 16:39:12 EST news160673874 In the first neuroimaging study to examine motor execution in children with autism, researchers at the Kennedy Krieger Institute have uncovered important new insight into the neurological basis of autism. The study, published online in the journal Brain's April 23 Brain Advanced Access, compared the brain activity of children with high functioning autism and their typically developing peers while performing a simple motor task -- tapping their fingers in sequence. http://www.physorg.com/news160235365.html Medicine & Health Wed, 29 Apr 2009 14:50:12 EST news160235365 UCLA scientists, in partnership with 30 research institutions across the country, have identified a new gene variant that is highly common in autistic children. And when researchers scrutinized the activity of the gene, known as CDH10, in the fetal brain, they discovered that it is most active in key regions that support language, speech and interpreting social behavior. http://www.physorg.com/news160145737.html Medicine & Health Tue, 28 Apr 2009 13:56:02 EST news160145737 Children who are firstborn or breech or whose mothers are 35 or older when giving birth are at significantly greater risk for developing an autism spectrum disorder, University of Utah School of Medicine researchers have reported in a new study with Utah children. http://www.physorg.com/news160048134.html Medicine & Health Mon, 27 Apr 2009 10:49:29 EST news160048134 Lithium has been established for more than 50 years as one of the most effective treatments for bipolar mood disorder. http://www.physorg.com/news159516371.html Medicine & Health Tue, 21 Apr 2009 07:06:32 EST news159516371 New studies in pregnant mice using antibodies against fetal brains made by the mothers of autistic children show that immune cells can cross the placenta and trigger neurobehavioral changes similar to autism in the mouse pups. http://www.physorg.com/news159207023.html Medicine & Health Fri, 17 Apr 2009 17:10:49 EST news159207023 The twiggy boy who greets strangers at his Cedar Hill, Texas, home with a handshake and an impish grin bears no resemblance to the toddler who shied away from contact, screamed when he had to walk down the stairs and spent hours staring at the ceiling fan. http://www.physorg.com/news159107746.html Medicine & Health Thu, 16 Apr 2009 13:36:25 EST news159107746 During the first week of class, the teens' eyes were downcast, their responses were mumbled and eye contact was almost nonexistent. By Week 12, though, these same kids were talkative, responsive and engaged. http://www.physorg.com/news158340517.html Medicine & Health Tue, 07 Apr 2009 16:28:58 EST news158340517 Eustacia Cutler sat at a piano, practicing Bach. Her daughter, Temple Grandin, was on the floor -- lost in her own world. Lost inside her 2-year-old mind. http://www.physorg.com/news157979417.html Medicine & Health Fri, 03 Apr 2009 12:10:44 EST news157979417 Scientists at Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University have proposed a sweeping new theory of autism that suggests that the brains of people with autism are structurally normal but dysregulated, meaning symptoms of the disorder might be reversible. http://www.physorg.com/news157813985.html Medicine & Health Wed, 01 Apr 2009 14:13:29 EST news157813985 Two-year-olds with autism lack an important building block of social interaction that prompts newborn babies to pay attention to other people. Instead, these children pay attention to physical relationships between movement and sound and miss critical social information. Researchers at the Yale School of Medicine report their results in the March 29 online issue of Nature. http://www.physorg.com/news157654287.html Medicine & Health Mon, 30 Mar 2009 17:52:54 EST news157654287 Individuals with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) tend to stare at people's mouths rather than their eyes. Now, an NIH-funded study in 2-year-olds with the social deficit disorder suggests why they might find mouths so attractive: lip-sync -the exact match of lip motion and speech sound. Such audiovisual synchrony preoccupied toddlers who have autism, while their unaffected peers focused on socially meaningful movements of the human body, such as gestures and facial expressions. http://www.physorg.com/news157558974.html Medicine & Health Sun, 29 Mar 2009 15:23:26 EST news157558974 Twenty years after first being assessed in a long-term autism study, 41 Utahns with the disorder had a higher social outcome than those in similar studies, University of Utah psychiatry researchers have reported in the Journal of Autism Research online. http://www.physorg.com/news156768213.html Medicine & Health Fri, 20 Mar 2009 11:51:01 EST news156768213 A robot named Cosmo has become six-year-old Kevin Fitzgerald's unlikely ally in his uphill everyday battle with developmental difficulties. http://www.physorg.com/news156752579.html Electronics Fri, 20 Mar 2009 07:24:48 EST news156752579 Something strange is going on in the amygdala - an almond-shaped structure deep in the human brain - among people with autism. http://www.physorg.com/news156696839.html Medicine & Health Thu, 19 Mar 2009 15:55:15 EST news156696839 Hyperbaric treatment for children with autism has reportedly led to improvements in the condition, though previous studies were uncontrolled. Now, a new study published in the open access journal, BMC Pediatrics, is the first controlled trial to report clinical improvements. http://www.physorg.com/news156161909.html Medicine & Health Fri, 13 Mar 2009 11:19:11 EST news156161909 In a national survey conducted by the University of Minnesota, primary care physicians report that they are more likely to ask patients with autism about complementary alternative medicine (CAM) use and desire more CAM education for this population. The study of 539 U.S. physicians, published this week in Springer's Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, explores the attitudes and practices of primary care physicians caring for children with autism using CAM treatments. http://www.physorg.com/news156084212.html Medicine & Health Thu, 12 Mar 2009 13:44:41 EST news156084212 A study led by researchers at the University of Southern California (USC) and Vanderbilt University have identified a specific gene variant that links increased genetic risk for autism with gastrointestinal (GI) conditions. http://www.physorg.com/news155187811.html Medicine & Health Mon, 02 Mar 2009 03:43:54 EST news155187811 A paper published online today in Nature Neuroscience reveals the presence of methyl CpG binding protein 2 (MeCP2) in glia. MeCP2 is a protein associated with a variety of neurological disorders, including Rett Syndrome, the most physically disabling of the autism spectrum disorders. The researchers show that MeCP2-deficient astrocytes (a subset of glia) stunt the growth of neighboring neurons. Remarkably, these neurons can recover when exposed to normal glia in culture. http://www.physorg.com/news154610775.html Medicine & Health Mon, 23 Feb 2009 11:48:25 EST news154610775 (PhysOrg.com) -- The day that robot playmates help children with autism learn the social skills that they naturally lack has come a step closer with the development of a system that allows a robot to monitor a child's emotional state. http://www.physorg.com/news154119076.html Electronics Tue, 17 Feb 2009 18:52:00 EST news154119076 It is estimated that three to six out of every 1,000 children in the United States have autism - and the number of diagnosed cases is rising. Autism is one of a group of series developmental problems called autism spectrum disorders (ASD) that appear in early childhood, usually before age 3. Through symptoms and severity vary, all autism disorders affect a child's ability to communicate and interact with others. http://www.physorg.com/news153399422.html Medicine & Health Mon, 09 Feb 2009 10:58:40 EST news153399422 A Brown University research team has discovered something in the brain that could serve as a target for future autism and mental retardation treatments. http://www.physorg.com/news152994663.html Medicine & Health Wed, 04 Feb 2009 18:31:46 EST news152994663