Synaptic Density and Autism, explained

….or at a podcast with at least an attempt at an explanation of what synaptic density is and how it is affected in brains of people with autism. This week we review three convergent lines of evidence – whole brain, brain cell then genes within those brain cells – that show that the autistic brain has a decrease in cell-to-cell communication in multiple brain regions, leading to social communication impairments.

https://www.science.org/doi/pdf/10.1126/science.adh2602?casa_token=bjtbuFi5U88AAAAA:_ffcE-pGCPxh4re24ix_xDgenAS1cAgDHLIMJJQCCG_1LvxaJKrGwEb9LFuMNsTYhvtGqRwro1A1Smc

https://academic.oup.com/cercor/article-abstract/34/13/121/7661138?redirectedFrom=fulltext&login=false#no-access-message

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/39367053

What’s Quality of Life Got To Do With it?

This week’s #ASFpodcast highlights a new study from Dr. Elizabeth Kaplan-Kahn, who is improving a measure of Quality of Life for autistic individuals who are minimally verbal or have cognitive disabilities. These individuals may have different outcomes as other autistics, but their responses are just as important. Dr. Kaplan-Kahn talks about what it means, how it is related to other outcomes collected, and what’s she’s doing to improve Quality of Life measures.

She working to do this through scientific study! If you or a family member is non-speaking or cognitively disabled, and want to help with improving measures of Quality of Life, click here: https://redcap.link/pablid